The Foreigners: A SAO Fanfic
by TheUnamedAussie
Summary: I used to love video games, then I got stuck in one. Forced to go through a death game with my friends and the 10,000 other gamers that brought SAO. It doesn't look like my chances of getting out of this alive are high, but if I do manage to get out of this alive I would have learnt a valuable lesson. A game is always at its worst upon release.
1. Chapter 1: When shit hit the fan

**Chapter 1:When shit hit the fan**

'Link Start', two words that started a whole mess of trouble. No, that's not true. I guess that it really all started when my friends and I bought a game. Well I say bought but really Banette got hired for the beta so that the language translation coders (Or something like that, I never really cared enough to pay attention) could test to see how English was translated to Japanese since the two biggest markets for the game were Japanese and English speaking gamers, So Banette managed to get the full game for two of his friends as compensation for his contribution for making the game. He had always been like that, gave a bigger damn about free merchandise than about money. Not that I can complain, it got me a free game.

What game was that? Only Sword Art Online, the very first VRMMORPG ever made for the NerveGear, and since I love long acronyms I immediately feel in love with this game. That doesn't mean I was immediately good at it though. That is why Banette had to teach Anale and I how to play the game. Or at least he tried to, it was a little harder than it looked.

" **SHIT!** " I screamed out as I ran from the boar that wanted to avenge its fallen brethren. "Save me Banette" I didn't really understand why Banette wanted us to get into the habit of using each other's usernames instead of each other's real names while in SAO, but I wasn't about to argue with the guy who got me the game.

"Your hopeless, you know that Dizmo?" Banette said as he killed the boar with a punch while I ran past him with the boar on my ass. Yeah that right one _punch._ Banette refused to use any weapon in favour of using his fists, like wise he preferred to use no armour other than a ruined hooded robe that reached the ground which he used to obscure his characters face and some heavy duty gauntlets that he calls the 'Ceastus', in memory of dark souls 2.

"You're a focking twat mate" Anale gasped out in between chortling laughter. "Learn your fucking place in society." He managed out as he finally came down from the hilarity of watching his friend get wrecked by a low level enemy.

"It's harder than it looks man." I said, only for my sentence to be ended by Banette slapping me on the back of the head.

"No it's not, it's easy as fuck."  
" **OW** , hey that hurt" I exclaimed rubbing the back of my head  
"No it didn't, you can't feel pain in SAO." He was right of course. Despite the look of his attire he was probably one of the most experienced players in SAO, and training noobs was a major waste of his time.

"What do you want me to do now then?" I asked, ignoring Anale's laughter at my expense.  
"How about you get some damn **SKILLS!** How about you go kill those damn **PIGS!** Get some **LEVELS DAMNIT!** And don't even try to blame it on your _NOOB_ armour" He said (More like yelled some parts) as he pointed at a recently spawned boar.

"Okay, okay, keep your pants on, I'm going." And so I went, for the 4th time today, and I had counted. Anale found it easier to kill the boars than I had. To be fair he had a giant fuck-off buster sword while I had a wimpy dagger. Banette explained to me that I should use a dagger since my skills were better suited for it. Something about my high speed and dexterity make using a dagger quickly and effectively much easier for me while Anale had higher strength so two handed weapons were better for him.

In short it meant that I can doge and run like a bitch, and that's about it. 'Can't give a hit for shit can't take a hit for shit, just run' is how Banette put it. Yet he still expects me to be able to kill anything the Anale could.

This time though, instead of running at the boar like an idiot I decided to try a different tactic. _'So I can't take a hit, but I can dodge. Let's make the enemy attack first'_ So with that though in mind I walked up to the boar. I was about five meters away when I picked up a nearby rock and threw it at the boar. Drawing the boars' attention as the rock impacted with the boars head, making it turn to me and kick up dirt with its back hooves. For a moment it was as if those glowing red eyes were staring me down, then it charged. I planted my feet in the ground, ready for it's approach. As soon as it got close enough it thrust its tusk's upwards, aiming for my stomach. But instead of hitting me in the gut it hit nothing but air as I stepped back then around the boar and stabbed it in the back of the head before it could recover from its failed charge. One strike wasn't enough to kill it however as it threw its head around intending to strike me in the side, so I jumped back and slashed the boar in the face, making it's HP hit zero, finally killing it.

"I killed it, **HAHA** **I KILLED IT** " I yelled out in excitement.  
"You see that Banette? I killed it" I proclaimed proudly to my friend and instructor.  
"Good job, you managed to kill a low level boar with the starting armour. Also you didn't even do it correctly." He said flatly, as if this whole situation was getting boring to him, which I would be surprised if it wasn't already.

"What do you mean 'I didn't even do it correctly'?"  
"You didn't charge your attack." He stated bluntly.  
"…What"  
"Charging your attack. It's when you pull back on your weapon and hold it for a few seconds before striking. There are a bunch of combo's and stuff that you can use to do different charged attacks, but at the rate you're going you won't need to worry about those for a long time"  
"Well it looks like someone's grumpy"  
"Oh I'm sorry, I was stuck teaching a couple of noobs the basics instead of tracking down the new location of the first levels boss."  
"You don't have to be so sarcastic Banette" (even though he can't tell sarcasm)

After Banette replied with a facepalm he ordered me to try again, but to this time he wanted me to charge my weapon. I was getting better at the combat mechanics, this time it only took me two more attempts before I had the proper technique for charging my weapon down. (after the first Banette said 'usually people get better on the second shot, but you just stay a failure')

We spent the rest of the day grinding mobs and talking about the game. Banette was a walking encyclopaedia of information when it came to SAO, It makes me wonder why he is just a sub-par student at school. Either way, Anale and I learnt a lot from Banette while we were grinding. He told us about the later enemy's, were the best places to grind were, about a murder guild named laughing coffin because pvp assholes are apparently already apart of this game. Apparently though it was more of a highway robbery thing where they only killed you if you didn't give them all your loot.

We also talked about making a guild, something we usually do early on in most mmo's we play together. It had become almost a routine. We enter the game, get our bearing`s, play for an hour or two, then logoff for the day. Or at least I logoff while Banette grinds twenty levels, I almost think he does it just to piss me off, But then I remember that Banette just doesn't give a fuck. It doesn't matter either way though since Bannete told us that you can't make a guild until you complete a quest on floor three, which means we probably wouldn't need to worry about making a guild for a long time.

After about three hours of grinding we went back to the spawn town, 'The Town of Beginnings' was its name. When we got there we spent some time to spend our items and buy some new clothes. I got a brown hooded robe, I didn't really like the colour but the stats were really good and Banette told me that I would be able to dye it later. Anale got some upgraded armour, to me it looked a lot like his previous armour but with some more metal mixed into it but to each his own. All in all it was a pretty good day, and to end it off Banette was taking Anale and I to somewhere he called 'the perfect screenshot location'. That's how we got to where we were now, hiking up a massive fucking mountain while the sun was setting overhead.

"How much further do we need to go?" Anale called to Banette  
"As long as it takes" was his reply  
"It has taken us like twenty minutes already, I'm going to have to logoff in about half an hour man." I said, adding my two cents.  
"Well then shut up and walk." And so we did, for about five minutes.  
"Seriously how much longer is this going to take?" I questioned.  
"Yeah this is getting boring" Anale said, agreeing with me.  
"Shut up, were nearly there"  
"Oh yeah? How close?" I questioned, we had been walking for almost half an hour and I would need to logoff soon.  
"Just climb up this cliff" Banette said with a wave of his arm in the direction of the cliff. It was more like a rocky wall with a few places that could make improvised footholds. With a shrug from Anale and I the three of us began to scale the cliff, I managed to make it to the top first despite Banettes head start, And what I saw took my breath away.

I stood there on top of the mountain, looking over the beauty and majesty that was the first floor. The sun was finally setting in the distance, colouring the sky's orange, making large trees cast incredible shadows and reflecting light off of the large bodies of water that were scattered throughout the plains making them shimmer in the sunset. From up here SAO felt amazing, it felt real.

"Hmm, it looks better in the sunset" Banette mused quietly to himself, standing to the left of me.  
"How did you find this place?" I asked, refusing to take my eyes off of the beautiful tapestry that was painted in front of me.  
"I found it in the beta. I got board of grinding monsters and decided to explore. I only found this place thanks to dumb luck, and as far as I can tell no one else knows about it."  
"It's incredible" Anale whispered to himself, standing on my right. He was apparently trapped in a similar awe as myself.  
"So this is our little secret, our own little slice of the garden of Eden" I said a peaceful smile on my lips.  
"It more a mountain top of Eden" Banette corrected  
"I don't even care, it's ours all the same." Was my reply, the peaceful smile never leaving my lips. This place felt incredible, as if the entire world revolved around just one location on top of a mountain. I was really incredible; it just had a way of making you forget it was just a video game. I felt at peace, and I never wanted to interrupt that peace by leaving. I just lost myself in the view of the world.

"Well, I need to go take a shit" And then the world came crashing back down on me.  
"Wow Anale, way to ruin the moment."  
"Hey man, when you got to go you got to go"  
I gave an exasperated sigh and pinch to the bridge of my nose before I replied. "Okay, fine. I needed to logoff anyway and here is a good place to log back into, so yeah. See you guy's tomorrow morning, is around nine okay to you guys?"  
"I have church tomorrow, I won't be on until later. Play without me though, you guy's could use the extra experience. Especially you Dizmo." Banette said after I got an affirmative from Anale, who was in the process of logging off.

"Hey Banette where's the logoff button" Anale asked confused.  
"What are you talking about" Banette replied  
"The logoff button, where is it"  
"On the bottom of the menu"  
"No it's not"  
"what are you talking about?" I asked Anale. Surely he was just being an idiot or a troll. The logoff button was on the menu somewhere. Or at least that's what I though until I opened my menu only to notice the distinctive lack of a logoff button.  
"Banette, he's right there isn't any logoff button. What's going on man." I asked my friend, convinced he would know the answer.  
"Your both idiot's, the logoff button's there your just not looking hard enough." He said confidently.  
"Maybe we should try asking an admin for help" I suggested to Anale hopefully, I was convinced there had to be a reasonable explanation for this. I mean there are a ton of games that go through shit on their release, I mean look at Diablo 3. That was an error thirty-seven simulator at launch, compared to that this shouldn't have been a worry.

Before I could receive a reply from Anale or a sarcastic insult from Banette something happened. I wasn't entirely sure what it was at the time, all I knew was that I was enveloped in a blue light, the feeling of weightlessness for half a second and then the blue light again. Except I wasn't in our self-proclaim 'mountaintop of Eden', instead we were in the city of beginnings. Just so there is no confusion, when I said _we_ I didn't mean Anale, Banette and I. No I meant **EVERYONE ON THE SERVER!**

"What the hell is going on?" I asked to no one in particular, as I was barraged with a multitude of Japanese murmurs of confusion. I couldn't understand what they were saying but I was pretty confident that they were asking similar questions as I was.

"What are they all saying" Anale asked.  
"One second, let me turn the translation matrix on" Banette said, his voice almost completely monotone except the slight layer of annoyance at having to change the settings. He was always like this, one of the funniest and most random people alive, if sometimes a massive stubborn asshole, but he was almost impossible to surprise. It was as if he was prepared for any surprises.  
"Hey how do you do that, which option is it in the settings?" I questioned, Banette's blasé attitude calming me to the surprise of the teleport that had pushed the absence of a logoff button to the back of my mind.

"I'll tell you later faggot, if someone says something important I'll tell you that too." As much as I wanted to complain there were two things stopping me, the first being that I understood that he was getting annoyed teaching noobs something as basic as how to change settings, even if it was a type of setting I had never heard of before, he deserved a break from the complaints and the questions. The second being that he turned on the translation matrix before I could complain and was now speaking Japanese.

After a few seconds of everyone running around like headless chickens somebody yelled something and everybody looked to the sky. It didn't take me long to see the giant red WARNING sign in the air, especially when it rapidly duplicated itself to the point that it enveloped the sky, turning it red and making the normally peaceful town of beginnings seem a lot more sinister. Or maybe the sinister atmosphere came from the blood falling from the sky.

"WHAT THE FUCK IS HAPPENING HERE" I screamed.  
"Well I don't need to go to the toilet anymore." Anale said, standing next to me, while it looked like everyone else was stuck in a state of silent shock. Honestly I'm surprised no one else was freaking the hell out, but Anale and I are Australian and have always been really loud and vocal with our reactions so maybe it's just us. I mean Banette wasn't freaking out, but truthfully I would have been surprised if he did freak out.

It got even weirder when the blood pooled together mid-air and turned into a giant grim reaper looking thing that had no face. Japanese games are weird, but since no one else reacting to badly I was convinced that it wasn't something to be worried about, Christ was I wrong. The reaper continued to talk, in Japanese, for a while before showing some news video clips, that were in Japanese, then continuing its speech, in Japanese. It's safe to say that Anale and I were completely lost, we had no idea what was going on. We were definitely confused when everyone started checking their inventory, Anale and I gave each other a shrug before checking our inventories ourselves.

"Where the hell did this mirror come from" I asked as I pulled it out of my inventory.  
"I don't know but I have one too" Anale replied as he took his own mirror out of his inventory. Then we looked into our mirrors, but there was nothing special about them. It felt kinda anti-climatic to tell you the truth, the sky turning red, blood pouring from the sky, the grim reaper giving a massive speech in Japanese then a weird item appeared in our inventories, I don't know I guess I was expecting more.

"Weird, I was kinda expecting something to happen." I told Anale, but it seemed that the universe decided to make me the fool since shortly after I said this Anale was engulfed in blue light. Yes, I know how stupid that sounds but that is what it looked like. In fact Anale wasn't the only one that this happened to. Everyone I saw was being enveloped by a blue light, until all I saw was this bright blue light. That is when I realised I had actually been enveloped by the light as well.

Before I could react to this sudden blue light it was gone as suddenly as it had appeared. I rubbed my eyes before I looked around, trying to get my bearings when I heard Anale exclaimed. "What the hell? You character looks like you, when did that happen?" When I play a game with a customizable character I usually try to make the character look as much like me as possible, of course SAO hasn't officially been released in any other country besides Japan so I was forced to make my character look as much like a Japanese version of me as possible. So when I heard Anale's shocked voice proclaiming that I looked more like my character I found it a bit odd, but when I looked up and saw what Anale looked like I understood the surprised tone in his voice.

Anale usually did the exact opposite of me so instead of the giant, white, steroid abusing, goateed afro-man with face that not even a mother could love that I had gotten used to in SAO when I thought of Anale, I saw what Anale looked like in real life, a slightly black shaggy haired, tall, white skinned, brown eyed with only slightly above average height and what could be the beginning of a beard, In other words, your average gamer.

I immediately checked the mirror that was still in my hand, to be greeted by shock face. Dark brown, messy hair that was long enough to be annoying and wide, light blue eye's that were stuck in a state of shock. I looked up at Anale, him being only slightly taller me, I'm sure that my eye's showed nothing but fear. Things were getting really getting freaky, not in a weird video game sort of way. More like a 'Devs are getting stalky' sort of way.

The Japanese reaper talked a bit more before disappearing into a weird blood coloured mist and the world turned back to normal. The crowed was stuck in what had to be a shocked silence, Banette was not though, instead he just grabbed Anale and I and led us away from the crowed. He led us to some out of the way merchant square, I think they sold dye's. I would have to remember that for later.

"Okay this shit is pretty serious" Banette finally said after turning of the translation matrix  
"What's going on?" Was my reply, Banette was never serious, and he was then it was worth listening to. "Okay, now I'm not going to repeat myself so you better listen now. We can't leave the game anymore, if we die in the game we die in real life. Apparently a shitload of people are already dead because people tried to take off their nerve gear so they died. The only way we can get out is if we complete the game and beat the boss on the hundredth floor."  
" **BEAT AN MMO?!** IS THAT EVEN POSSIBLE?"  
"Dizmo calm down"  
"No I will not calm down Banette, this is bullshit. What the fuck is going on? What the fuck are we going to do?" I began to freak out, thoughts of my family and friends were in my mind. I had never even heard of anyone beating any MMO, I thought it just couldn't be done. But before I could fall further into hysteria Banette slapped me across the face with his plate gauntlets.  
"Calm the fuck down bitch; you aren't doing anyone no good. Take a second to think about this shit, if we all freak out and die now we won't get out of the game."  
"How can we even beat an MMO?" Anale asked, breaking out of his shock.  
"I've beaten TERA online"  
"that's one game, do you even know if we can beat this one?" I asked to Banette's reply  
"Nope, but there are like ten thousand gamers who are going to be dedicating themselves to this game twenty-four seven. If they can't beat this game no one can, even if two hundred are already dead."  
" **TWO HUNDRED** **PEOPLE DIED?!** "  
"Well two hundred and thirteen"  
"Were doomed" I said as a fell to the ground and slumped against a wall.  
"Shut up bitch"  
"Why aren't you freaking out?" Anale said to Banette, with a lot more composure than I was showing.  
"Nothing to freak out over, we'll get out. Might take a few months, a year at the most, but eventually we'll kill the boss on the hundredth floor and get out. Until now this is just like a break from normal life."

"Your confidence isn't contagious Banette" I said with a sigh "But I'll be dammed if I didn't need some confidence right around now. There are a few major problems that we have to deal with though, one we don't speak Japanese, two were too low level to do jack shit and three level's and experience won't mean anything if people keep dying. We would get to the final boss and have nobody to fight it."

"Dude you don't need to even worry about the final boss right now" Anale said to encourage me. To be honest I was more of Banette's friend than I was Anales, but we would have to get over that if we want to get through this.  
"Oh yeah, and the setting for the translation matrix is in the language setting's" Banette told us, as if the information was meaningless instead of being one of the only means of communication that we would have for however long it would take to get out of this game.  
"I didn't even know there was a language setting." I said while we all opened out settings to change the language translation to Japanese.

"Okay now what do we do?" Anale asked.  
"Wow that's weird" I said, his lips looked like that were speaking in English, but it came out in Japanese, It really was weird.  
"Yeah I know, anyway, there really isn't much we can do. We should probably try to get some sleep though, I know an inn just a few minutes down the road from here, lets go." Banette told us.  
"Just like that?" I asked, I was kind of hopping for more of a plan.  
"Yeah, we can get our shit together tomorrow, after we cool our heads." With that Banette took us to a hotel so we could get some sleep, Anale and I asking Banette question's along the way.

While Banette and Anale were sleeping in room's either side of my own I was messing around with the settings. That's where I found this journal tab, buried in the 'social' options. I don't know if that 'Kayaba' asshole that trapped us here put it there to mock us or something, but I'm going to make the most of it. If I manage to make it out of this hell hole alive, I want to have my journey written down so hopefully, some day, I can find it when I get out of this place.

That's thinking too far into the future, and getting out of here is a big if at the moment. At the moment Banette has convinced Anale and I to take this one day at a time. So tomorrow I still need my sleep, one day is currently really far away but tomorrow is a lot closer.


	2. Chapter 2: Into the Labyrinth

**Chapter 2: Into the Labyrinth**

The next day Banette woke us up at around seven o'clock in the morning, I didn't even know he woke up that early. He always seemed like the type of guy that would only wake up at ten at the earliest, to me at least. That didn't stop him from literally dragging us out of bed to go and grind levels and loot with him.

He wanted to get to all the good grinding spots before anyone else, apparently all the mobs can be grinded to the point they don't spawn anymore. It's always a pain when a game does that, but right now it's sort of a matter between life and death. The first place he wanted to take us was to the fields to the west where we were going to grind on boars, and wolves. Not the hardest or most rewarding enemies but we were following Banette's lead and he wasn't going to take any chances when it came to us. We kept that routine for a few weeks, keeping a few days every week open so Banette can show us how to level our support skills on our own.

I really respect that guy, he doesn't always show it but he is loyal and caring when it comes to his friends. I could tell that we were just slowing him down, he could have easily been twice the level he was after the first week but he stayed with us to make sure we didn't die. I could count on both hands how many times he has already saves both Anale's and my own life. Between the two of us were lucky that our names weren't crossed out from the monument of life.

That's another thing, after the day that asshole Kayaba trapped us in the game something else changed. It took us a couple of days to realise this, but the Room of Resurrection was replaced with the Monument of Life. So if a player is killed instead of them re-spawning in the Room of Resurrection all that happens is that their name gets crossed of from a giant stone tablet. Not a fair trade off if you ask me but I don't get a say in matters like that. Just seems like another way for Kayaba to mock us. I am really starting to hate that asshole, I don't see how he gets to play God with the lives of people like Anale, Banette and I.

I wonder why he did this, whether it's some kind of sick form of power hungry wish fulfilment where he gets to look down upon us while he sees himself a God or if it's some kind of fucked up science experiment where he uses us as guinea pigs. I don't know what I hate the thought of being more, A pawn to stoke a madman's ego or a lab experiment. Neither seems particularly enticing.

I quickly found out that levelling in this game is as easy as skinny dipping in the artic, that is to say so hard to do you have to be stupid to try. It took us three weeks to hit level six, once we did Banette showed us to a guy he knew from the beta. He called himself Nakuzi and said he was an information broker, they basically are a substitute for a wiki in SAO since we can't access the internet anymore. He seemed a little sketchy but Banette vouched for him so he couldn't have been so bad. Nakuzi told us about a few secret locations, in exchange for money of course.

As much as I didn't trust the guy I couldn't fault his actions, it's thanks to people like Nakuzi that people can get the proper information that they need to make it through the game alive. It turns out that Nakuzi doesn't just deal in quest and loot info, I paid the guy fifty cor in exchange for local information while Anale and Banette were browsing the markets. Apparently peaceful players (people who are too afraid to go out and risk their lives fighting monsters) use info brokers to get info about how other players are doing at getting them out of the game, doesn't mean that the only info worth listening to happens on the field.

This is where I found out who the first player to die in game after Kayaba's message was. Apparently this one kid named Arvin who jumped off from Aincrad thinking that it would log him out, worst thing is that no one's knows if it worked or not. Arvin could have either died for nothing or been smart enough to see through Kayaba's bluff, scary when you think about it like that. Still, a ton of people followed him of the ledge after he died. No matter what became of him in real life in SAO he has become some sort of morbid symbol to most players, don't know what he is meant to represent though.

I also found out that people who were in the beta had started making themselves scarce ever since Kayaba's announcement, since people are starting to blame beta testers for all this. Not that I blame them, everyone's angry and the easiest people to get angry at are the beta testers.

Doesn't mean that I agree with them since there main argument is that the beta testers are leaving regular players to die, which is just not true. People like Nakuzi, who were in the beta, are becoming info brokers to help give people the proper information to not make a stupid mistake and die. Then there are people like Banette, okay fine I haven't really seen many people like Banette around the place. Whenever we see a player in trouble or still trying to learn the ropes Banette will pretty much drop whatever he's doing to help that player out. He's starting to get a reputation around the town of beginning's for helping people out, they call him the insane sensei, probably because he still hasn't gotten rid of his torn up cloak.

It was a couple of days after visiting Nakuzi that Banette decided that we were high enough level to take on a place called the Labyrinth, apparently there's one on every level and there used to get to the next level but people only recently found the one on level one. I knew it was going to take a long time to finish the game, but I didn't think it would take so long to find the door to level two. Really puts a damper on my mood whenever I think about it, but I'm getting better at picking myself up and carrying on with my life, It help to have friends there to support you.

Anale and I were pretty excited though, this was going to be our first dungeon in SAO. We had heard about how the dungeons in SAO were massive multi-story mazes that just went on forever, it's pretty hard to not get excited when you know you're going to be taking on something like that. That's why our first impressions were a bit of a letdown.

"This is the labyrinth?" I asked upon seeing the dungeons entrance "Looks like a hole in the wall to me." Anale added. He and I had become close friends since getting trapped in SAO, especially since Banette was becoming increasingly distant from us. Emotionally I mean, the guy was boxing himself in. It's not usual for him to be really emotive but he's barely shown any emotion since week one. That's odd even for him. Still he replied with,

"Looks can be very deceiving, never trust a book by its cover, or a chest at first glance" Deciding to be mysterious in his replies, another habit he had picked up since week one.

"I don't even know what you're saying anymore Banette"  
"Dizmo, you of all people should understand what I am saying, your support skill, after all, are made for creating and uncovering deception." He's right though, I had taken a liking to support skills like lock picking, hiding, reveal, searching, stuff like that, still doesn't mean I can 'Reveal' the logic behind Banette's ramblings.

"Okay guys, let's just get on with the dungeon. I wana kill some shit." I could tell Anale, was trying to prevent tensions from rising, not that anything would have happened but it's the thought that counts. He knew that I was getting sick and tired of Banette babying us through our levels, I could tell that he spend a few hours every day in harder areas while we were asleep or taking a day off. I mean Banette was level nine, that's a full three levels ahead of Anale and I. Granted we were nearly up to level seven and I don't think Banette is that far along with his level, but the point still stands. At least Banette was taking us somewhere that would be a challenge, Or so I thought.

After an hour of killing monsters on the first floor I noticed something, Banette was deliberately keeping us in area's that had already been explored. "Hey, why aren't we going to higher floor? We would get more exp and loot that way" I asked Banette, wondering why he was holding us on the lower level floors.  
"No were staying on the lower floors end of discussion."  
"Yeah, but why?" I asked again  
"Bitch you back talking me?" Banette demanded  
"Maybe I am" I Said in retort  
"Hey calm down, were in the middle of a dungeon" Anale said trying to calm us down.  
"Why should I?" I demanded "He is babysitting us through all this, making it so we don't get higher levels. I understand safety when it comes to this game, but we need to take some risks if we want to help clear floors."  
"Who says you will be clearing floors?" Banette replied.  
"What do you mean, Of course we'll be clearing floors. I'm not going to sit in the background doing jack shit while other people die for me. It's not how I was raised." I crossed my arms as I said this, My parents didn't raise a coward and I always enjoyed reading about war history when it came to Australia's contribution. The Australian military seemed to have a very strong sense of loyalty to brothers in arms, Mate-ship they called it.

"You're not going to be fighting any bosses"  
"You've got to be kidding Banette" This time it was Anale that voiced his objection, seemed like he had the same idea as me.  
"Nope"  
"Nope, is that all you have to say?" I demanded "Banette you can't just give us a one word answer and expect us to follow you blindly. I'm thankful for all you've done for me and I'm sure Anale feels the same" I looked over at Anale who gave me a nod while I spoke "But you can't expect us to sit idle while we could be doing something to help get out of this hell hole."  
"I would rather be an alive coward than a dead hero" Was his only reply, that damn quote he just loved to use. He never made an action without knowing he would come out of it alright. Sure he loved to challenge himself, like right now how he used no weapon other than his fists and wore a cloak that gave him next to no armour, but he would never make a big risk for a stranger. Sure he would go out of his way to help others, but he knew he would be coming out of those fights alive.  
"Listen I don't want to argue philosophy with you right now, can you at least take us to some higher floors, maybe to an unexplored area? I bet that Nakuzi would pay us for more info on the labyrinths layout." I encouraged.

"Perhaps" Banette mused "but I don't think you guys are ready for higher levels"  
"Come on Banette, we will be level seven before tonight and the level one boss is only around level fifteen. As long as we don't go above floor level nine or ten of the labyrinth we will be fine" Anale said, surprising Banette and I both. Or at least I think Banette was surprised, it's hard to tell especially since he hasn't taken of the hood of his cloak since we got trapped here.  
"So you've been talking to Nakuzi than" Banette said in a monotone voice. I knew this tone, he was annoyed but knew he was beat. There were two things he could do right now, either take us to higher levels or leave the dungeon. As much as I am ashamed to admit it, I would probably follow him no matter which he choose, I owe him that much.  
"So what if I have?" Anale said, as if challenging Banette. "I paid him, and I have the right to use his information"  
"What about you Dizmo, have you been hearing rumours from Nakuzi as well?" Banette asked, it was kinda scary the way he asked me though. His voice was completely flat and emotionless, I couldn't tell what he would do next. So with no clue what to do I nodded, deciding to tell the truth. Then Banette did something unexpected, he smiled.  
"That makes me glad, you used the tools at your disposal so that you wouldn't be caught with your pants down because you had no info on an enemy. You are getting better at the game, we will go to the higher floors today." Anale and I perked up when we heard this, it was not often, if ever, that Banette conceded defeat in an argument.

"I still disapprove of fighting bosses though, it is a stupid risk that shouldn't be taken. There is no point in trying to beat a boss if you die while versing it, we want to get out of the game not die." That would be an argument for later, but let's not focus on that just yet.  
"So Banette, do you know what sort of enemies we will be fighting on the higher floors?" I asked  
"If the floor one labyrinth is the same as in the beta, and from what I have heard despite the change in the layout it is, the enemy's will be the same as the ones we have been fighting now but at a higher level."  
"Awesome" Anale exclaimed  
"We are actually quite a high level for the first stages of the labyrinth so we will be exploring new territory, none of the other players have gotten to the floors we will be fighting on so stay close and keep your eyes open for any surprises." The enemy's we had been versing up until now were these little red things that look almost like goblins but we really didn't care about their names, Anale and I just called them 'red fucks' against Banette's chagrin.  
"What kind of surprises should we be expecting" Anale asked just a few seconds before myself.  
"I don't know, it's a surprise remember" Banette said after an annoyed sigh "honestly, do you not understand the definition of a surprise." This made me chuckle, the game had been changing everyone but it had obviously affected Banette more than the rest of us, even if he didn't show it. Yet not matter how much Banette changed it seems that he still has no patience for stupid questions.

"What's so funny Dizmo?" Anale asked after Banette finished scolding  
"Just remembering times before SAO, Banette has changed so much but I don't think he will ever be too different from the Banette we knew before SAO." I said as we walked through the previously cleared corridor, back tracking to the next floors stairs.  
"What do you mean?" He said as we turned another corner, Banette continuing to take the lead.  
"This shit has gotten us all in a tiffy, Banette most of all, It's really been affecting him in ways he's not letting us see. Yet no matter what he's still the same old Banette."  
"What the fuck is a tiffy?" Anale asked  
"Shut up mate, you know what I mean!"  
"Do I though? Do I really?" He said while waggling his eye brows.  
"Christ mate, that face is so fucking ridiculous.  
"What? This is my face mate, don't make fun of my face!" He said before making the same face while adding a dumb smile for the sake of the joke. It made me laugh my ass off, metaphorically of course, up until the point I made a snort and then Anale joined me in my laughter.  
"Oh god, this is so dumb" I said in-between laughter  
"Then it's time to wise up then" Banette said making me jump.  
"Christ don't sneak up on us like that" I exclaimed  
"I didn't sneak up, I stopped walking and you didn't notice me because you two idiot's were laughing too hard" He said in the monotone voice that Banette was using to the point it was borderline abuse. "There are two Kobold scouts up ahead, you two go take care of them." Anale and I gave Banette an affirmative before we advanced on the kobold scouts, these guys were 'red fucks' that wore some leather armour and carried around a knife. They were not the most difficult of enemies, but at the level we were at they shouldn't have been.

"I've got the left one, you take the one on the right" I told Anale as we got closer to our targets. Instead of answering me though Anale decided to run forward screaming with his buster sword held above his head in preparation to strike. "Fucking idiot" I mumbled under my head as I ran to catch up, I'm also pretty sure that Banette double face palmed, not sure though. One thing that came from that was the fact that Anale had a high level Fighting Spirit skill meaning that all the enemy agro was on him. So by the time he got close enough to slam his sword vertically killing the 'red fuck' on the left instantly, I was already behind the right 'red fuck' delivering a proper charged backstab. I was proud of that backstab, if you do one correctly you do a ton of extra damage but the problem is that the hit box for the backstab is really small. It also changes depending on what type of enemy I fight, so the fact that I have pretty much mastered backstabbing boars, slimes and wolves means jack shit against these more humanoid enemy's.

" **WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?!** " Banette screamed at Anale while I backed away slowly from the imminent shit storm that brewing between my two friends.  
"Tactics" Anale said proudly with a dumb smile plastered on his face. Anale has a very askew sense of humour, he will do something he knows is stupid then give a terrible reason for doing it or just shrug it off entirely as if it was nothing. No matter which path he chose he would always wear the same dumb, smug smile, probably just to piss people off.  
" **THAT WASN'T TACTICS! THAT WAS JUST STUPID!** " Banette looked as if he was just about foaming at the mouth when he took a few deep breath and calmed himself down. That's when I decided to try and intervene. "Look Banette, what Anale did was stupid, reckless and could have easily gotten us killed if it was in any other situation. These are low level monsters and Anale and I could survive a few hits, but since were going to be fighting higher level monsters from here on Anale won't be taking anymore stupid risks, **right Anale**?" I said ending with a question to Anale who begrudgingly apologised to Banette who, after slapping him on the back of the head, accepted his apology.

And so we trekked further into the dungeon, up to our goal of floor eight since Banette refused to take us any further. Not that I was arguing, it was good experience and the combat got more challenging. It even made Anale more serious in combat instead of dicking around like he usually did, that in particular made the combat more fun. Anale's combat preference and my own complement each other well when used in tandem, We found a good system were Anale takes the front line to draw the agro of the enemy while I use him as a distraction to sneak past and flank the enemy. Banette pointed out that Anale was better built for middle line or back line combat due to the reach his two handed sword has and the fact he can't carry a shield, but he didn't deny that it was an effective combo when performed correctly.

"If we keep this up we could hit level eight before we leave" I said as I stabbed a Kobold guard in the back, making it explode into fractals. The kobold guards were tougher than kobold scouts were, about two ranks up enemy wise I think.

"With all the money we've been getting we will be set for ages, we could probably even buy our own house instead of stay at the inn tonight" Anale said as he slid his buster sword into its sheath.

"You can't buy a house in Tolbana, you can only rent rooms and inn" Banette pointed out.

"You know what I mean" Anale retorted

While my friends were arguing I was looking around for any loot we might have missed, that's when I saw it and it looked beautiful. "Hey guys, look at what I found." I said directing my friends gaze to my latest discovery. "That can't be right, those aren't supposed to spawn until at least floor ten" Banette said as when he saw the chest that was planted just before a dead end. "Maybe the spawn rate was changed since the beta" Anale suggested "Who cares?" I said as I approached my precious "It spawned and that's what counts" I said pulling out some lock picks to try picking the lock on the chest. "I nominate myself for first pick on loot" I said as I slid the picks into the lock, the smile on my face disappeared instantly when the chest opened on itself to reveal two sets of sharp teeth, and before I could react my hands had been bitten of and I was sent sprawling onto the floor screaming as I went. " **SHIT!** " Anale yelled as he began to pull out his buster sword, but before he could act Banette had slammed his fist down on the jumping chest and proceeded to mercilessly pommel the thing to death with nothing but his fists until the chest exploded into fractals and Banette dinged as he was given the level up notification.

I just sat there with my mouth agape, eyes wide open barley processing the situation. Instead I was staring at my hand, or to be more accurate I was staring at where my hands used to be. In their place was some weird pixilated stubs, my eyes began to water as I continued to stare at these things that had taken the place of my hands. I couldn't use these things, without my hands I would never be able to wield a dagger, I would never be able to fight, never be able to get out of this death game that had become my life for the foreseeable future. Tears ran down my face as I saw these ugly stubs and realised what the represented, the represented the end of my life. Without them I would be forced to sit and let others fight to escape SAO for me. No not just that, without my hands I will need someone to help me eat, get dressed, open door and even go to the god dammed toilet. I remember hearing how someone who had both their arms broken needed to have someone help wipe their ass for them, what sort of life was that? Not one I wanted, but without my hands I was destined to live the rest of my life helpless.

I was abruptly snapped out of my thoughts however when I received a slap to the face that snapped me back to reality. "Stop crying faggot!" Banette exclaimed, but I was too caught up in my loss of limbs to get angry at him at the moment. "My hands" I spoke, barley more than a whisper "they're gone"

"Yeah so?" Banette asked

"What am I going to do now" I mumbled to myself

"Oh right you probably need someone to help you take a healing crystal then, don't you?" Banette asked.

"What?"

"Here, let me help" Banette said as he pulled a red healing crystal out from in his cloak and slapped me in the head with it, making me use the item. Shortly after Banette used the item on me I saw how a blue pixaly wave rippled through my body, as it reached my new stubs it re-created my hands. It was a weird experience but one I relished as the use of my hands returned to me. I stared at my hands in awe for a while before Banette addressed me, drawing my attention.

"Now are you going to get stop acting like whinny bitch and get off your ass?" I blinked once before I was on my feet and a second later I had my hands wrapped around Banette in a massive hug. " **AAHH** \- what are you doing?" Banette asked as I held him in a tight hug.

"Shut up you marvellous bastard" I exclaimed as I hugged the man who gave me back my hands.

"Group hug!" Anale exclaimed a second before joining the hug.

"Okay this is getting kind of gay, can you let me go now?" Banette asked after a few seconds.

"Sure" I said as the three of us proceed to untangle ourselves from each other. As I write this journal entry I realise how gay that sounds, that is not what I meant so get your head out of the gutter whoever is reading this.

"So you up for some more grinding?" Banette asked after a few minutes.

"Hell no, after that scare I want out of this dungeon. At least for today" I added as an afterthought.

"Aww I was having fun" Complained Anale

"Fun is only fun as long as you keep breathing, let's get outa here." I said as we pulled out our teleport crystals. This was going to be the first time Anale and I used these, but we really couldn't be pissed backtracking through a bloody dungeon.

"Hey Banette, how much money do you think Nakuzi would give us for the amount of map we uncovered?" I asked after the blue light from the teleport faded from my eyes

"Probably a few hundred cor I will ask him tomorrow, why?" Banette asked in reply

"Just wondering, when you do see him remember to tell him about the fucking mimic that showed itself. Don't want someone else to fall for one like me." I said as the three of us walked through the darkened streets of Tolbana.

"You wouldn't have fallen for the mimic if you had used reveal on it before hand" I winced as he said this, he was right, I shouldn't have been so quick to open it but a lesson learnt is better than being dead. Anale on the other hand let out a bark of laughter.

"HA before **hand** " he said

"wow man, too soon." I chided him before sparing a chuckle myself.

It was a good end to an eventful day, we ate some epic steak to celebrate our safe return from the labyrinth before retiring to our beds for rest. Banette agreed to make the next couple of day's solo day where we can just chill and not have to worry about grinding. I on the other **hand** am just happy to be alive. In all seriousness that mimic nearly killed me, and the thought of dying like that still scares the crap out of me. I really need to get better if I'm going to get out of this place, but there is no need to worry about that now. Now the only thing I need to do is look forward to the sleep in I am going to be having tomorrow, right now I am just happy to have the luxury of surviving another day. Let's hope I can keep it that luxury for a while longer. 


	3. Chapter 3: Mistaken Identity

**Chapter Three: Mistaken Identity**

This morning was better than most, instead of being thrown out of bed and onto the floor at the crack of dawn I got to sleep in. When I finally got out of bed at eleven o'clock it was to the sound of ambient background noise, birds chirping, people walking outside the inn stuff like that and it was nice. I got dressed in casual clothing; I never had the chance to get anything too flashy so I dressed in a white shirt and some brown slacks. _'I will have to add that to the list of shit to do this weekend'_ I thought to myself as I walked down the stairs of the Inn _'It's going to be great, Banette never let us take a look around the game. Ever since Kayaba trapped us here it's all been about grinding, I am overdue for a break'_ I thought while I sat down on a chair in a table that was placed near the stairs. The Inn looked different later in the day, usually we were out the door before anyone else was up. The only other people to see us would be NPC's.

I decided to indulge myself and brought a rather expensive meal for breakfast, a lot pancakes with a side of ice-cream. Not too expensive but more than I would usually pay for breakfast, but after Banette, Anale and I split the loot from the labyrinth run I had more than enough to splurge on breakfast. I sat there eating my pancakes, enjoying the fact that the nerve gear could stimulate the correct synapses in the brain to simulate certain tastes, when three people approached me looking like they wanted something.

"Can I help you?" I asked in between mouthfuls  
"Hello" The one who appeared to be the leader of the group greeted nervously, the guy was a few years older than me, eighteen or maybe nineteen. He had short black hair and stood a few inches taller than me.  
"Yes, hello" I said politely as I placed the cutlery down next to my meal "Is there anything I could help you with" I repeated.  
"Yes, well maybe, you see I- we were just wondering, why, umm you see it's just-" I held up my hand to cut him off. "Listen if you have something to say, say it. I don't mean to be rude but all this umming and aring is a waste of my time." Really it wasn't, I had nowhere that I needed to be but they didn't know that and I kind of wanted to finish my breakfast before hitting the town.  
"Yeah of course, well you see what we wanted to ask, if you don't mind, we would like to know-"  
"What's up with your voice?" The one on the left cut in. He was a smaller man a few years younger than me with much the same complexion as the first. In fact the woman on the right who looked to be the same age as me had a resemblance to the other two as well, maybe they were family.  
"Gobusa!" The eldest said appalled at the younger boy's behaviour "Don't be so rude!" I honestly didn't care if the kid interrupted me, they all actually looked kind of nervous around me so this kid's direct approach was appreciated.  
"Nah it's okay I don't mind sharing" I said to the group, before waving a hand across the table at the three empty seats. "No reason you need to be standing while we talk" I offered them. There was a moment of hesitation on their faces before they sat down.  
"You see the thing that is wrong with my voice is the fact that I don't speak Japanese."

"What? But your speaking Japanese to us right now" The woman asked visibly confused.  
"No I'm speaking English, you are just hearing it as Japanese" I explained.  
"So you're English then?" The eldest asked.  
"Well no I'm Australian, but I guess that's just semantics."  
"Are you the Insane Sensei? Can you train us to better fight monster?" The eldest asked me, the three of them had their faces full of hope. This was probably going to suck, but before I could tell them that I wasn't the 'Insane Sensei' they started to beg.  
"Please, we have heard stories of your valour and experience, we have heard how you have saved many inexperienced players and have taught them how to survive. Please take us on as your apprentices, Insane Sensei" The oldest said before they all got out of their seats and bowed to me, Christ it was embarrassing for them and me both. People were looking over at these three Japanese guys bowing to a white guy, had to be weird to look at.  
"Oh shit" I said "Umm, yeah, don't bow"  
"Will you take us on as you're apprentices?" The woman asked hopefully, none of them getting up from their bow.  
"Seriously, just stop bowing and sit down please, this is getting kinda weird" They finally stop bowing to me and sat down before the eldest one hesitantly asked "So will you make us your apprentice's mister Insane Sensei."  
"Okay, first off I am not the 'Insane Sensei' like you think I am"  
"What?" the woman exclaimed "But you're the Australian player who wears rags and uses no weapon aren't you?"

That question confused me quite a bit at first, then I realised they were talking about my casual clothes. I mean sure, they were a bit plain but I wouldn't call them rags, I actually felt pretty insulted by that. "No, I'm in casual clothes, I'm not the 'Insane Sensei'" I spat back.  
"But you're Australian aren't you?" The eldest asked  
"Yeah so" I said.  
"Well since you're Australian, you should know where we can find him, right?" The woman asked.  
"Miss what is your username?" I asked in fake politeness  
"My username?" she asked confused "My user name's Minsa" she answered  
"Minsa, just because I am Australian doesn't necessarily mean I know where every other Australian in the game is" Actually there's a good chance that I do know where every Australian in the game is, not their exact location of course but I would easily be able to find them. Not that I was planning on telling that to a few random asshole's who wanted to interrupt the only proper breakfast I've had in weeks, but these guys were looking pretty desperate so I decided to be nice.

So I sighed before I decided to tell them "Listen, you got lucky because I just so happen to know who the 'Insane Sensei' is and where you can find him."  
"But I thought you said that you didn't know him" The youngest, Gobusa, accused.  
"No I said that not all Australians know each other, I didn't say that I don't know him" I replied  
"Where can we find him?" The oldest asked excitedly.  
"mate, what's your username?" I asked  
"Zanute"  
"Well Zanute, I could tell you where he is but why should I?" I might sound like an asshole when I say this but I know that Banette would be pissed off if I brought some random's for him to train. The only reason he sticks with Anale and I is because were friends, and after the incident with 'Mr Sheep' he tried to avoid strangers who immediately wanted to follow him.

"Greedy bastard" I heard Minsa grumble quiet enough that if my listening skill wasn't high enough I wouldn't have heard, but I did.  
"We are prepared to pay you" Zanute pleaded, "How much do you want?"  
"I don't need any money, right now I've got more than I know what to do with"  
" **THEN WHAT DO YOU WANT!?** " Minsa screamed as she slammed her fists onto the table, right into my breakfast. I had put up with these assholes interrupting my meal, I put up with them thinking that I was Banette but I am not going to put up with them destroying my pancakes. The pancakes were a reward to myself and all the hard work I had done over the last few weeks and now that reward was nothing but fractals in the wind, fractals that I would avenge for all that it represented. Also the pancakes tasted really good and I felt the way that I was being treated was very rude but the other points still stand.

All three of them went dead quiet as I slowly got out of my seat, even Minsa was silent as what she just did registered with her brain. "I'm done here" I said while walking away "and don't try to find Banette, I doubt he would help you guy's anytime soon." I called over my shoulder before walking out the door. ' _Asshole'_ I thought, referring to that bitch Minsa ' _where does she get off with an attitude like that. Her gear was shit too, all of their gear was. They wouldn't even survive one day with Banette with gear like theirs.'_ I fumed a while longer before taking a calming breath. ' _Shit, I need some time to myself, all of these people are making me feel claustrophobic. I wonder if the mountain top is still a secret or if other's have found it yet.'_ I thought as I headed to a crystal merchant to stockpile on teleport crystals.Tolbana is the second largest city on floor one, not only that but it's also the closest city to the labyrinth by a long shot. Due to that all of the fighters and Info brokers stay in Tolbana. Anale, Banette and I were lucky to get to Tolbana early on since by now all of the rooms in Inns and farmer's houses have already been taken. The over population in Tolbana does serve a dual purpose to me though, since the 'Mountain top of Eden' is in the mountain's towards the south and has a lot of slightly higher level monsters. If I'm lucky and none of the grinders that camped the area found the 'Mountain top of Eden' before heading for the labyrinth in the north than I doubt any of the 'peaceful players' would have found it.

"Teleport, town of beginnings" I commanded as I used a recently brought teleport crystal, my armour and weapons re-equipped for the journey through the mountains. Once the tingly feeling of teleportation wore off I was faced with the town centre. The town off beginnings is the largest city on the first floor and takes up a large portion of the map, but now it's nothing but ghost town. Sure there are still a few groups of people here and there, but mostly you will only find NPC's. It's not hard to see why everyone left, It would bring back horrible memories from when this all started. From what I've heard from Nakuzi most people hate the town of beginnings because it makes them sad or terrified, but all it does is make me angry. Seeing this empty town square reminds me of why I am fighting and grinding instead of waiting it out like hundreds of other players. I used that fuel as anger while I sliced and stabbed all the enemies in between me and the 'Mountain top of Eden'. By the time I had climbed up the top of the mountain I was all fought out. I just sighed and lead back against a large rock as I slid down it into the cool embrace of the floor.

' _It's still the same as before'_ I thought, as I closed my eyes and let the calm breeze flow through my annoyingly long hair. I was going to get it cut on the weekend that this all started, in fact I was going to get it cut on the day that we got trapped here. I love having long hair, the way it can shake my head and feel my hair fly around with the motions. Of course then if it's too long it gets in your eye's, and whenever I let my hair grow too long pimples go wild on my face. Something about how the grease from my hair gets caught up than falls onto my pillows that I then put my face on. Despite that I usually just let my hair grow wild until the point that it bothers me too much, and this time I let it grow so much that my fringe reached my nose. Not that you would be able to tell that at first glance, my hair is extremely curly and just seems to fall in on itself, it's how I got away with long hair in school for so long.

My musings about hair were unfortunately interrupted by several feminine grunts of exertion as someone climbed up the mountain. ' _It seems my little secret isn't so secret after all'_ I thought to myself without opening my eye's, hoping that whoever it was would see me and leave quietly. I heard the mystery woman gasp before making light steps towards where I was seated. Obviously whoever it was didn't know their manners since a few seconds after the walking stopped I heard her unsheathing a sword. That is when I decided to open my eyes, only to find a face I was hoping I wouldn't see in a long time. Minsa, with her wooden buckler strapped to her arm and her sword pointed at my face.

"Get that thing out of my face" I said calmly  
"Tell me where I can find the 'Insane Sensei'"  
"and why should I do that?"  
"Because if you don't, I'm going to kill you" She threatened me.  
"Did you know that I am one of his best friends, In game and IRL?"  
"So what? Your still going to tell me where he is" She spat out  
"Well you see" I began, ignoring her threatening statement "He is very protective of his friends, to the point that he might even take your life in payment for mine." I said making her pause in thought.

In the moment that she inadvertently lowered her guard I acted. Moving like the wind I quickly drew my dagger and jumped on her, swiping at her sword. Causing her to lose her grip on it and send it flying over the side of the cliff. "You idiot" I sighed as I put my dagger back in it's sheath and sat back down against the rock, making sure to keep Minsa in my sights. She was frozen solid, looking at the place where her sword went over the cliff, before she finally just fell into a heap on the floor. She looked defeated and on the verge of tears, and as much as I wanted to act like a vengeful asshole due to her actions at my breakfast table, I just could stand to see someone cry. Maybe it was the look on her face, maybe it was the fact that her crumpled, defeated body was placed right in front of the view of floor one or maybe it was something else but I decided to take pity on her.

"Want to talk?" I asked  
"What?"  
"Talking, do you want to do it?"  
"Why?"  
"It can make you feel good, helps get things off your chest. Now do you want to talk or play a game of who, what, when, why?" I asked as I patted the ground next to me.

Minsa looked both confused and conflicted as she made her way towards my offered seat and sat down. I didn't say anything deciding to let her speak first, and after a few minutes she did.

"What do you want to talk about?" she asked  
"This was more for your benefit than for mine"  
"so you just wanted to talk to me? Why?"  
"I already answered that question, try another one."  
"Fine, why are you being so nice to me? I mean I just threated you at knife point and your acting extremely calm about it."  
"You know what, I'm not sure about that one. I guess I just saw that you were breaking and didn't want to see you chase your sword over that cliff. Too many people have committed suicide already, if I can help prevent one more than I'm more than happy to help. There also the fact that for you to threaten me you have to actually be a threat in the first place." I said with a chuckle  
"Hey! I am plenty of a threat"  
"Yeah sure you are, what level are you exactly"  
"Level two" She grumbled "But that's more than enough to take on someone like you. What level are you anyway? Level four or five?" she asked, defending her low level.  
"Actually I'm level eight" I managed to get the last bit of experience from the monsters in the mountain since their higher level than any on the monsters on floor one except the ones in the labyrinth. Which makes me wonder how a level two could get past them and all the way up the mountain.  
"Level eight? Yeah right, there's no way you can be that high level."  
"Ha, you think that's good? The Insane Sensei is level ten" I said, being careful not to use Banette's username.  
" **LEVEL TEN!? HOW!?** " She exclaimed/screamed in shock.  
"I'm pretty sure he skips a lot of sleep, he gets Anale and I up at seven in the morning and grinds with us up until around ten at night. Whatever he does in-between that time is anyone's guess, at first I thought he went to sleep at the same time as Anale and I but recently I've begun to doubt that."  
"He sounds pretty intense"  
"Oh you don't know the half of it Minsa" I said with a chuckle "So how did a level two like you manage to follow a level eight like me?" If it wasn't for her low level I would have guessed she put all her time into tracking or a skill like that.  
"you cut your way through all the enemies in the mountain's, I just followed that."  
"Really? So then you were planning on catching me when I took a break?"  
"sorry about that" she blushed with embarrassment before continuing "Actually when I saw you climb up the mountain I figured you were going to kill something than come back down, that's when I was going to ambush you."  
"Oh really, what changed that plan?"  
"When the mob's that you killed re-spawned I… I had to run and the way you took was the only place that the mobs wouldn't follow me" She grumbled causing me to break out in laughter at her poor planning and defensive attitude, which in turn caused her embarrassed blush to become a shade darker.  
"It was the only thing I could do at the time okay" she spat out as I came down from my laughter.  
"Your cute when you blush, you know that right" I teased her with a cheeky grin. Causing her to blush even harder and stutter out a response.  
"SHUT UP YOU JERK!" She yelled as she gave me punch on the arm, making me chuckle even further.  
"Ow, okay, fine I'll stop." I said as I rubbed my offended arm.

Minsa crossed her arms and gave a 'humph' as she turned her body away from me. I let silence rain supreme for about a minute before it became too much for me. "Why would you try to threaten me in the first place?" Her shoulders sagged a bit as I asked her this, she didn't turn to me as she answered. "Isn't obvious? I wanted to know where to find the 'Insane Sensei'"  
"Okay, but why did you want to find him in the first place?"  
"Because I wanted him to train us"  
"You know the question I'm asking, stop dancing around it and just tell me what wrong." There was a long pause, long enough that I thought she wasn't going to answer me but eventually she talked.  
"Those guy's that I came to talk to you with were my brothers" she finally said "We were all trapped in this game with our parents and Gobusa's twin brother Gibusa. While all the other players went and fought monsters to grind for experience our parents wanted to take a different route. They convinced us to pick fruit's to sell from the forests instead of fighting monsters. That gave us next to no experience and only enough money for us to scrape by, but at least we were safe. Dad wanted to try fishing, so Gobusa, Gibusa, Zanute and I were saving up to buy him a fishing rod for his birthday. Four days ago we were picking fruit in the forest when a bunch of players started harassing my mum and dad, demanding that we all hand over our money, they called themselves laughing koffin. My dad told them no so they killed him" She sobbed, tears streaming down her face "Mum told us to run and we did, we ran all the way back to the town of beginnings. It was only when we stopped that we realised that Mum and Gibusa hadn't followed us. Gibusa was only twelve years old, Gobusa was crushed and now he barely ever talks anymore. After that we decided that we needed to get better and to do that we needed someone to help teach us. That's when we heard about the 'Insane Sensei', the madman in rags from Australia who walked floor one helping those in need. We spent the money we were going to use on a fishing rod to buy ourselves some gear and spent days trying to find him. We heard a rumour that he slept in the 'Cosy House Inn' in Tolbana, so that's where we went. After you brushed us off because of me I got so mad, I wanted to make you tell me where to find the 'Insane Sensei'. So I followed you until I saw you teleport, I spent all of my money on a teleport crystal and went to where I heard you call out. You already know what happened after that." She finished with a sob. I absolutely hate to see people crying, especially girls. So I wrapped my arms around her in a comforting hug. We spent quite a while in silence, with her sobbing into my shoulder. Eventually though she managed to stop crying and pull herself away from my hug.

"You all cried out?" I asked as she wiped away the rest of her tears, then punched me in the arm again. "Hey! What the hell was that for?"  
"You never saw that, got it? You never saw me cry."  
"Fine, but if anyone asks you've never been here before. Got it?"  
"Why do you want to keep this place a secret."  
"Why do you think, It's incredible up here. It feels as if all the worries of this death game just can't climb up to get me when I'm up here. This is also the place that I was at before getting teleported to the town square."  
"Yeah, I guess it does have a pretty amazing view. How come you found it when everyone else past it by?"  
"I didn't find it, it was shown to me."  
"By who?" she asked.  
"The guy you call the 'Insane Sensei' took me and a friend up here on day one."  
"Day one and he was exploring the mountains? How did he get so good at SAO in such a short time?" Minsa asked more to herself than to me.  
"It's probably because he was in the beta"  
"He's a beta tester?" She asked in disgust  
"Yeah, the only non-Japanese speaking beta tester, why?"  
"The beta testers have left us for dead. I've heard of some beta testers who would do anything for loot and experience, even killing other players." She explained distastefully.  
"Well Ban- Insane Sensei isn't like that, just cause a few crazies go overboard doesn't mean that all beta testers are assholes."  
"Maybe, I still can't believe that he's a beta. Beta's are meant to be ruthless jerks that would stop at nothing to get levels."  
"Perhaps you're not so off the mark, he is kind of mental and he can be pretty fucking ruthless" The fact that he mercilessly smashes his enemies with nothing but his fists should describe the type of person Banette is. "But he has his good moments too, so don't just judge him because of others."

I guess she had nothing to say about that because we just sat in silence for about half an hour before I decided that I had enough sitting around. "Tell you what, I'll buy you a new sword if you show me where the best clothes store is" I said stretching as I got up.  
"What?"  
"You need a new sword and I need some new clothes so I think we can help each other out."  
"You're the one who sent my sword over the cliff if I remember correctly."  
"Yeah you're right I did send your sword off the cliff, after you threatened to kill me with it."  
"Fine, I'll help you find some better clothes. Besides if what you were wearing in the Inn are the best clothes you have to wear then it's obvious that you need to update your wardrobe"  
"ouch, you've wounded my incredibly fragile ego"  
"good, it's about time someone did."  
"Yeah alright, well let's get back to the town of beginnings" I said as I pulled out my teleport crystal.  
"I don't have a teleport crystal"  
"What? I thought you said you followed me using one."  
"Yeah but I didn't have enough money to buy a second one" She said nervously.  
"Fine, use one of mine" I said opening up the trade menu to give her a teleport crystal  
"Thanks"  
"Don't worry about it, just remember to always buy two teleport crystals. Getting caught in the middle of a bunch of mobs when you have low health and no teleport crystal is as good as a death sentence." With that we teleported to the town of beginnings.

We spent the rest of the day out shopping, I got her better everything while she helped me pick out a bunch of clothes I even convinced Minsa to buy some casual clothes for herself. It was my goal to never have to go clothes shopping in SAO ever again so I got tones of different clothes for every occasion. The day was coming to a close so we decided to have dinner in the town of beginnings, Minsa knew of an awesome restaurant that apparently served some delicious western dishes, in other words pasta, burgers and pizza's. I ordered myself a spaghetti bolognaise while Minsa got a cheese burger. We were swapping stories as we ate, I was telling her about my time in the labyrinth when we were interrupted.

"So then instead of following the plan he ran in there screaming like an idiot drawing all the agro"  
"Oh my god, that's so stupid" She gasped in between breaths  
"Oh yeah, I know. Anale just can't take this game seriously." I finished  
"Minsa! There you are!" A voice said from behind me, I turned around to see Minsa's older brother Zanute walking up to us with Gobusa in tow.  
"We were so worried about you when you just took off like that, what are you wearing?"  
"Sorry mate, though I would take her out shopping. Why don't you sit down and join us? The grubs on me." I offered.  
"Wait, your that guy from the Inn. Minsa what's going on, you haven't been harassing him have you? I apologize on Minsa's behalf for any stress she has caused you" Zanute said with more manners than Minsa had shown me all day.  
"No worries mate honestly, after we had a little scuffle we talked everything out."  
"A little scuffle, Minsa what did you do?"  
"Oh so It was immediately my fault, how do know it wasn't his fault" Minsa said, referring to me.  
"Mister…"  
"Dizmodon, but just call me Dizmo"  
"Mister Dizmo, did you attack Minsa?"  
"Nah, I was just taking a nap and when I woke up Minsa had a sword pointed at my face"  
"MINSA!" Zanute exclaimed  
"Hey! You sold me out"  
"Well I saw no reason to lie"  
"Mister Dizmo I am so very sorry about the actions Minsa has taken against you. She has always been impulsive and quick to anger but that is no excuse for her threatening your life."  
"This is so embarrassing" Minsa mumbled, making me chuckle.  
"Zanute you can just call me Dizmo, there's no need for formalities like Mister. Also I'm going to tell you what I told Minsa, you have to actually to be a threat to be threatening."  
"Hey! I told you, I'm threatening."  
"And I told you that you're not." I said with a smile "So what do you guys want to eat?" I asked Zanute.  
"We couldn't possible ask you to buy us a meal Mist- Dizmo."  
"You're not asking I'm offering, But I guess that I've already eaten plenty already and it would be awkward if I was sitting down watching you eat. Listen I'll tell you what, I'll give Minsa some money to buy you guys a meal and I will just stay at an Inn" I said as I opened the trade menu and gave Minsa about half of what I had left.  
"Wait, this is fifty thousand cor!" Minsa exclaimed  
"We can't accept that much money" Zanute insisted  
"Well you have it now and I'm not taking it back. Use the money to buy yourself some better gear." I said getting out of my seat and heading towards the exit. "Oh and Minsa, meet me in that secret place in one week. I will introduce you to the 'Insane Sensei' then." I said over my shoulder, closing the door behind me before they could react.

As far as days go off, this one wasn't that bad. I got a lot done and made a few new friends, It's sad what happened to them though. The fact that laughing koffin have started to kill people may be fitting with their name but it's still a shocking surprise. Tensions are running high and groups like laughing koffin aren't helping. At least we've found the labyrinth, It's not going to be much longer until we get through to floor two. We're going to get through all of this, and when we do I'm going to fly to Japan to punch Kayaba in the face. Today was kind of exhausting, It reminds me of why I don't go shopping with my sister or mum. Takes six hours between the two of them to decide that they don't want a pair of bloody shoes. I need some sleep, tomorrow is going to be the last day of my little two day vacation and I want to make the most of it.


	4. Chapter 4: Have a Nice Trip

**Chapter 4: Have a nice trip**

Before getting trapped in SAO I tended to stay away from MMO's, which is funny in some sick way since SAO was the first MMO I signed up for since Elder Scrolls Online, and ESO was a massive fucking let down for me. I never wanted to get drawn into the hype of an awesome online game only to find a monthly subscription fee that there was no way in hell I wanted to pay, In fact the only MMO I really played often was Star Wars the Old Republic. That's not the point I was trying to make though, back when I did play MMO's often I had a favourite pastime for when my friends were holding up the party. That pastime was pointless parkour. I would always revel in the confused reaction of my friends when they came back from a bathroom break to find me dancing on the head of a statute or stuck in a tree with no easily visible way for me to get there. In fact Banette would sometimes do the exact same thing, that's probably how he found the 'Mountain top of Eden'.

One of the things that I love about SAO (when you get past the death game thing) is the acrobatics skill, which is basically like the jump skill from Elder Scrolls: Oblivion but more useful. With this skill towns and cities become my playgrounds, or at least in theory. As it turns out mountain goat climbing random buildings in SAO is not as easy as it is in other games. In fact my alchemy skill is increasing fast than my acrobatic skill thanks to all of the health potions I've made.

I managed to get a lucky streak though, I was jumping from building to building pretty successfully and it felt amazing. The sense of vertigo I got whenever I looked down, the wind going through my hair, the way buildings became a blur as I ran past them. All of this formed together to create something beautiful, a sense of freedom I never felt in the real world. Then when I jumped across from one building to another my foot got caught on the side of the roof and I tripped, after smacking face first onto the floor I rolled off the roof and fell three stories to the ground with my face in the dirt. All in all it was a very discouraging experience, and If I could still feel pain in SAO I know that It would have hurt in the morning.

"That looks like it would've hurt" A male voice said from above me.  
"Yeah, a fall like that would have really fucked me up in the real world" It had to be one of the worst fail I had all day so of course someone was there to see it.  
"Then you're lucky you're not in the real world" I looked up to see a tall guy with long, messy blond hair offering me a hand. I was kind of surprised about his hair colour since most people in SAO had normal hair, I asked Banette about it once and he said something about how most Japanese people with strange hair colours are treated like delinquents.  
"Depends on which way you look at it." I said as I took his hand "Name's Dizmodon, I prefer Dizmo though. What's yours?"  
"My name's Pitt, what's someone like you doing free running around the town?"  
"Someone like me?" I asked genuinely interested in what he was implying.  
"Yeah, I mean you're a Info broker right? You guys don't need to give a damn about levelling skills like acrobatics so what gives?"  
"Wait, why do you think I'm an info broker" I have nothing against info brokers but I wasn't one and that wasn't going to change anytime soon.  
"Well you obviously have a lot of money since your wearing all of those expensive clothes, the peaceful farmer types can't make that much and fighters can only make that much if they spend all of their time grinding, even then those types of fighters don't seem to care about the way they look. Their all about stat's not style, the only types of people in SAO that care about style and have enough money to do something about it are info brokers. So what are you doing running, or more like falling around the city."

I never thought about it before but what this guy, Pitt, says makes perfect sense. Minsa told me about how the only way peaceful players make money is by grinding resource items like food and plants for alchemy. She also said that you make next to no money that way and even less experience. Also the few grinders that I have met who have a ton of money look really weird, like how their armour can be so many different colours since they just don't care about what it looks like. Info brokers on the other hand are the exact opposite. All the info brokers I've seen, Nakuzi included, all wear the most fashionable things they can find. I once overheard some people in the Inn talking about the best way to tell if you are going to be scammed by an info broker is to see if their shoes are more expensive than the amount of money you have times ten.

Don't know why it had to be shoes but I got the point all the same, and after yesterday's shopping spree I had a rather extensive wardrobe of expensive clothes to choose from. "Well I'm not an info broker I can tell you that for certain, I'm actually just a fighter."  
"yeah right, what do you actually do?"  
"I'm serious, I go around killing mobs for money and experience."  
"If you have enough money to buy clothes like that you have to be either a grinder with a good info broker or a beta tester, not 'just a fighter'"  
"Well I guess I have a bit of both on my side"  
"Wait, are you a beta?" Pitt asked suspiciously  
"No but my friend is, he's helped me out quite a bit over the last few weeks"  
"A beta helping someone? I'll believe it when I see it."  
"Christ alive, everyone really hates the betas. What gives? I mean from what I can tell most people who hate the betas haven't even met a beta before."  
"Everyone is right to hate the betas! They're all greedy assholes who don't care about anyone except themselves."  
"calm down mate, let's just go our own ways before we start going to blows." I said trying to' stop an argument that was rapidly spinning out of control.  
"Mate?" Pitt asked in confusion  
"Yeah, what about it?"  
"Why did you say it? What are you pretending you're and Australian or something"  
"Well I shouldn't be pretending, I mean I am an Australian"  
"You can't be, sales out of Japan were scheduled for like a month after the Japanese release"

This guy seemed to know his shit since most people wouldn't know that without a bit of research beforehand. Even then Kayaba never decided to make that an official statement, guess I know why now. "Yeah, a friend of mine help with some software testing and managed to get a couple of rushed copies"  
"So you live in Australia but speak fluent Japanese?"  
"Oh hell no, I can't speak Japanese for shit. It's just some translation software that was put in the game."  
"So where is this friend then, the one that helped with software testing" Pitt said as he looked around as if expecting to see Banette.  
"Were having a few days off after a close encounter in the labyrinth, nearly died but I got a ton of Cor from it so I'm not complaining."  
"So what were you doing jumping around the city than"  
"I got bored and wanted to level up my acrobatics skill, not doing so great though"  
"yeah that's an understatement" He said with a chuckle "Looks like you must have lost a bit of health from that last fall"  
"Nothing a health potion won't fix" I dismissed with a wave of my hand

Pitt gave me this scrutinizing stare before he spoke again "Listen you seem like an alright guy so I'm going to help you out, but before I tell you anything you have to understand. If I find out you said anything to that beta, well let's leave it at that."  
"whoa mate, threats are pretty intense. What's going on?"  
"If you want to learn how to level your acrobatic skill properly I think I could help you out. Me and a few friends have this guild called 'The Soaring Eagle', were all about parkour and levelling our acrobatics skill. Not many people understand the value of a high acrobatic skill, but were happy to help anyone that want to learn." He said, wearing smile that was beaming with pride.

"Wait I thought you couldn't form guilds until floor three, what gives?" The only reason that Laughing Koffin is a guild in the first place is because their cracked, all of their members don't show up as part of a guild.  
"Well yeah, but were going to officially form the guild when we hit floor three. Until then were just a bunch of guys who love parkour, and as long as you don't tell that beta asshole about us I'm sure we would be able to teach even some like you the basics."  
"Hey I could use all the help I can get, my alchemy skill is getting more attention at this rate. Speaking of alchemy…" I trailed off as I took a health potion "right, now where do I start"  
"You want to start learning today? I've got to admit I admire the determination, follow me" I wasn't about to correct his praise by telling him that I wanted to start now because today was the first day in a long time that I had off and that I didn't know when I would be free after today, ' _he will probably find that out_ _later but I'm not going to tell him until then_ '

He climbed up the building I had fallen from so I followed, admittedly at a much slower pace. When I got to the top I saw him standing on the opposite ledge doing the superman. "Took you long enough" He said without turning around "Were going to have to work on your climbing, until then I want to see how well you can jump from one building to the other. Jump to this building over here" He said, gesturing to building he was facing. "Remember not to look down when you jump" I learn that one the hard way, first few times when I looked down before jumping I flinched at the height and tripped.

Pitt was looking at me expectantly so I used a running start before jumping across the divide, while the jump went okay the landing was a different matter. I almost landed on my feet but tumbled at the last second and fell on my ass. ' _At least I didn't fall of the building this time_ '. I was greeted shortly after by Pitt who wore an amused grin on his face. "Okay for starters that was terrible, next time you want to tuck your legs in and roll into the landing. Roll will break some of the momentum from your fall"  
"This is going to be a long day isn't it?" I asked as I picked myself up  
"You bet it is, first few levels are always the hardest. You're lucky that you have someone to help train you though, I know a few guys who have accidently PKed themselves from missing a jump."  
"Let's hope I don't end up luck them then"  
"you've got a long way to go Dizmo, but eventually you should get better. God knows how long that's going to take"  
"Well aren't you just full of encouragement"  
"Yeah, yeah. Now go again"

I did, this time however I tried to tuck my legs in mid jump and roll through the landing. I didn't do so well at it as fell flat on my ass after failing the roll. "Well at least you listened to me, that's a start I guess" Pitt said as he helped me up "You sort of failed at getting up from the roll though, that's a pretty important part."  
"Baby steps are still steps, so where did you learn to do all of this" I asked pitt  
"Me? I've been doing parkour since I was twelve, saw an awesome movie with parkour and started learning after that. After joining SAO it was easy to figure out how to incorporate my skill at parkour IRL into in game skill. Alright, go again"

This time I clipped my foot on the ledge after forgetting to tuck my legs in, I got the roll all right though and managed to get on my feet with only a little stumble. "Hey you didn't fall on your ass again, that's an improvement" Pitt encouraged after joining me once again. "So what's the deal with the Soaring Eagle then, do they know parkour to or do they just love jumping about SAO?  
"I guess you could say both really, we're all friends in real life who enjoy parkour. Not much to that really, there's about five of us in total. Maybe I might introduce you to them once were finished here." He offered  
"You sure they wouldn't mind? I don't want to intrude on your friendship or anything."  
"Nah it okay, the others wouldn't mind at all"  
"Well maybe later than, it depends how late it gets"  
"Yeah sure, now go again" 

I went again, this time I finally managed to get it done correctly. It was by no were near as graceful as the one Pitt performed as he jumped over to join me but it was still a win in my books. "Alright, I few more goes like that one and we might be ready to try something more than the basics"  
"What do you mean by 'More than the basics'?" I asked, dreading the answer  
"Don't worry, most of the tricks are done by the game on auto after you've set the moves up right." I knew the feeling, whenever you set up an attack correctly you can trigger a combo. When that happens your limbs start to move on their own to attack. Most people talk about how weird it is and how much they hate the experience. I honestly couldn't care less, In the real world I have next to no combat experience. Hell throughout my life I've only ever been in three fight, and the upper middle class white idiot I am I lost every one of them. Without the auto system I wouldn't have a chance in fighting all the monsters in SAO. "Of course the basics are important for any situation and this is just the bear minimum, now go again"

The rest of the day was filled with jumping, tucking, rolling and sliding. As much as it began to feel like grinding it also felt invigorating. It kind of makes me want to take up parkour in the real world, almost since I know how many left fee I have and would rather enjoy it if I broke neither of them because I tripped off a building and fell into moving traffic. As it was the sun was setting while Pitt and I sat on top of some merchant building winding down from a long day but just shooting the shit about random stuff. "So what's up with your username? Doesn't sound as Japanese as most names around here" I asked Pitt as I laid against a wall watching the sun drop behind some of the taller buildings.

"Yeah that because it isn't" He sighed before continuing "Okay fine, you see my friends and I try to separate ourselves from eastern culture. We don't have anything against our culture, it just gets boring after a while. We didn't do anything too big, small stuff like dyeing our hair and watching more western movies."  
"Okay, but how does this have anything to do with your username?"  
"Well when me and my friends-"  
"My friends and I" I corrected, cutting him off  
"Wow your one of those people, okay fine. When my friends and I joined into the game we decided to make our usernames the last name of our favourite western actors"  
I stifled a laugh before continuing "So your favourite actor is Brad Pitt then"  
"Hey man, he was awesome in fight club and ocean's eleven."  
"I wouldn't know, the only movie I remember seeing that had him in it was world war Z. He was alright in that I guess, but after the blatant product placement at the end Brad Pitt has become synonymise with Coca-cola in my mind."  
"What is wrong with you, when we get out of here I'm going to track you down and make you watch a bunch of Brad Pitt movies"  
"You can try, but IRL I don't speak Japanese. I'm from Australia remember, I only speak English in real life" It was more of a reminder for him since I had explained it earlier.  
"So what, they don't teach you Australians how to speak other languages?"  
"No it's not that, it's just a bit complicated for me. I was born in Brisbane which is the capital city of Queensland, when I was two my family moved to Melbourne. Can I just say for the record that Melbourne is filled with assholes, I went through hell there. Anyway, while in Melbourne I learnt German for around four and a half years until we moved to Perth when I was ten. I went to small primary catholic school for a year and a half, I learn two very important life lessons from that. The first being that catholic church ceremonies are boring as all hell and second being Italian. After primary school I went to high school where I learnt both Japanese and French at the same time, Japanese for one year and French for two."  
"wow, so you know a bunch of different languages then"  
"Oh hell no" I said with a chuckle "I've completely forgotten everything I learnt about speaking Italian and I could only say hello in French and Japanese. I remember how to speak German the best out of all of those and even that's next to nothing since I learnt it at a basic primary school level. Hell I probably even know more Latin than German, I learnt that from google translate because I had nothing better to do."

There was a peaceful silence before Pitt asked me a question. "So from all of those languages where does Dizmodon come from?"  
"If you're expecting my username to have some epic story or meaning behind it than you'll be disappointed to know that I just sort of hit my keyboard until I found a name that looked cool"  
"Really that's it?"  
"Yeah that's it, though I don't blame you for thinking I would put a hidden meaning behind it. I do that with literally everything else, the only reason my username is different is just because of chance. If you want a story behind a username then you can talk to my friend Anale, his story is short but funny."  
"Is he that Beta asshole? If he is I don't want to meet him."  
"Jeez calm down mate, just so you know he's not a beta. Besides that Beta asshole is my friend too so stop talking shit about him. You say anything you want about Betas in general, but you can't say bad shit about my friends."  
"Fine, what's the story behind that anyway? You seem like an alright guy, how did you get caught up with a Beta?"  
"What's there to tell? Were friends IRL, he managed to get me and Anale-"  
"Anale and I"  
"Okay fine, you got your revenge. Anyway he got Anale and I rushed copied of the game from Japan, that's why you won't find many people who aren't Japanese playing SAO. After that he help saved my ass more times than I can count"  
"So what he helped you grind then?"  
"We helped each other grind, thanks to him I'm level eight"  
"Your level eight? Now that's impressive, I would bet that only around three hundred player have gotten that far, most of them would probably be Beta's too."  
"Yeah, and that Beta friend I've been telling you about. He was level ten last time I saw him and that was two day's ago"  
"What would you expect, he's a Beta" He snarled "They just give a damn about themselves and getting the next level, nothing else"

When he said that something clicked in my head, Banette was a lot like the second part but nothing like the first. He would always push himself to get the best he can while always giving help the lower levels when they needed it. Yet he has almost no regard for his own self-preservation, Hell he often likes to tell us the story of when he went three days without sleeping only to pass out and wake up the next day to find himself sleeping on a bunch of Lego bricks that were lying around his floor. Speaking as someone who has stepped on a Lego brick with no shoes or socks on I can make a safe guesstimate when I say it must of hurt like a bitch.

"Maybe, but he would go very far out of the way to make sure his friends are safe. To me that loyalty counts for a lot."  
"See how much that loyalty is worth when he betrays you."  
"That's not going to happen"  
"We'll see, but if it does you can come seek me out. Bring that Anale dude with you if you want, you'll be welcome with the 'Soaring Eagles' any time."  
"thank you Pitt, though it's not going to happen. I've known Banette for years and I don't think he has once betrayed his friends, hell he tells me how he hates to lie because he physically feels bad afterwards."  
"Whatever, the offers still there" He looked up at the setting sun then upend his menu before he spoke again "Looks like it's getting late, do you want me to introduce you to the rest of the 'Soaring Eagles'?" He asked as he closed his menu, he must have needed to check the in game timer in the menu screed.

"Nah, I haven't seen the others in a couple of days and it's starting to get to me. How much do you want for the lessons?"  
"Don't even think about it, this was just a favour for a friend" He dismissed with a wave of his hand  
"Where should I go if I want to find you later?"  
"Just look under the bridge closest to the south gate in the 'town of beginnings'."  
"Cryptic but easy to remember, If you're looking for me you can find me in the 'Cozy House Inn' in Tolbana. I'm usually there most nights after ten at night and before seven in the morning, everything in between is when I'm grinding"  
"damn that's a lot of grinding, how aren't you a higher level by now?  
"We've been playing it safe, not fighting enemies we can't take down. Less loot higher life expectancy. Well I better be getting off now, see you when I see you" I waved goodbye as I pulled a teleport crystal out of my inventory"  
"Yeah you too" Pitt said before jumping from one building to the other in a display of acrobatic skill I doubt I will reach anytime soon

"Tolbana" I commanded before the blue tingly sensation enveloped me. That was the sixth time that I had teleported and it still felt weird to me. The sun had set and the moon was rising slowly in the sky when the teleportation was complete. I made my way through the darkened streets of Tolbana until I found myself at my destination, but something was different tonight. Usually the 'Cozy House Inn' would be relatively quiet as the night claimed the land, yet today the atmosphere was different in a way I just couldn't decipher. That was until I opened the door to the Inn and saw the massive crowds of men and woman, some in blacksmith attire others in varying types of heavy armour, and in the centre of the crowed was Anale.

"What the fuck is going on" I said more to myself than anyone else, that didn't stop a old, scruffy man with a epic grey beard and unkempt hair from answering my question. "That boy there won the heavy armour division of the blacksmithing tournament, truly he is a gifted blacksmith"  
"Anale?" I asked in disbelief. It was then that Anale noticed me and called me over. "Hey Dizmo, how's it going?" He called over the crowed  
"What the hell is going on" I asked once I was close enough that I didn't need to yell  
"Well I woke up early two days ago and decided to just bum around for a bit. Then I found this chick with pink hair named Lisbeth who gave me some pointers for blacksmithing. I actually saw you while I was blacksmithing, there was some chick stalking you which was weird."  
"You saw that and didn't stop her to ask why she was stalking me?" I interrupted "Dude she was planning on killing me"  
"Whoa, maybe I should have done something." He sat in thought for about a second before continuing on as if nothing happened "Anyway, then Lisbeth told me about this blacksmiths tournament. I figured since I'd been going at blacksmithing every spare moment we got that it would be enough to have a go." It's true, he really pissed Banette of this one time when he just walked of early in the day to do blacksmithing. "So I entered the tournament and made the best armour I could. In the end I won and got the hundred thousand cor prize money."  
"Shit, you beat other people at making heavy armour?"  
"Well no, I was the only one in the under sixteens division to enter so I won due to a technicality but a win is a win."

I face palmed before I realised what I was even doing, after I recovered I continued the convocation. "Well at least you got a shit load of cash out of all of that, what are you going to spend it on?" I asked, wondering if he would buy better armour or weapons. I did that very thing while on my shopping trip and imagined Anale would do the same.  
"Oh I already spent all the money"  
"WHAT!?"  
"Yeah, why do you think all of these people would be here? To celebrate some scrub wining a contest by consolation? Hell no get your head out of your ass, I offered to buy all the drinks tonight with my reward money." He informed me with that same stupid smile.  
"You are useless, I can't imagine how Banette would react when he finds out you wasted all that money"

Once again the universe seems intent on making me the butt of every joke, because it was in that exact moment that the crowed went quiet as a hooded man slammed open the door and entered the room. The hooded man that I recognised as Banette, but before I could give Anale a smug 'I told you so' Banette took one shaky step forward than another and then he passed out on the floor.

"SHIT!" Anale and I both exclaimed as we rushed to our friends unconscious body. "Is anyone here a doctor?" Anale called to the crowed "Anale you idiot, there's no doctor's in SAO. Why would we need a doctor for a virtual world?" I hissed under my breath. Yet of course, the universe hates me so a talk man with dark brown hair stepped forward from the crowd and raised his hand and exclaimed "IM A DOCTOR!" I was doubly surprised at that since the universe had never made fun of me twice on the same day before.  
"Shut up Anale" I told my friend as he gave me the same stupid smile, he should trade mark that fucking smile.

Anale ignored me as the doctor approached "Doctor, what is wrong with our friend?" Anale asked. There was a long silence as the doctor poked and prodded Banette in several places. He then eventually looked up Anale and I. There was a moment longer before he said "Your friend will be alright once you get him in bed. He passed out from fatigue, a common thing for players in SAO who want to do nothing but grind. It's smart to remember that there is a reason we have beds and a sleeping system in the game. He will be asleep until tomorrow night, besides that there should be nothing else wrong with him" I gave a sigh of relief at the news while Anale fist pumped the air and exclaimed "HE WILL LIVE" to the crowds who promptly began to loudly cheer.

"I don't even know how you managed to get the crowd to cheer like that" I commented later as Anale and I were carrying Banette up the stairs by his arms and legs.  
"You don't cross the guy buying you drinks, it's a universal rule." He said, trying and failing to sound sagely.  
"Sure it is, okay one… Two… Three!" I counted as we threw Banette onto his bed.  
"Well we have tomorrow off, want to spend it as another free day?" Anale asked  
"Nah, we'll figure it out tomorrow. Until then I want to hit the hay, keep the crowds quiet for me"  
"Hell no, I'm going to make them tap-dance on the tables, if you want to come down to party with us drinks are still on me."  
"Asshole" I chuckled as I opened the door to my room "See you tomorrow Anale"  
"See you tomorrow Dizmo" He called as he walked down the stairs.

Today was a pretty good day in the end, Anale seemed to have fun and god only knows what Banette got up to. I wonder what Anale and will get up to tomorrow, knowing him it could be anything his impulses tell him to do. As long as it doesn't get him killed I'm fine to join him. Great, now he's got everyone downstairs to start singing Bohemian Rhapsody. I'm going to go tell them to quiet down.

A/N: I really didn't want to add that part with Lisbeth at the end but the inspiration for Anale forced me to, sorry about that. I will try to make sure there is as few interaction with the main characters from SAO from this point forward.


	5. Chapter 5: Fucking Around

**Chapter 5: Fucking around**

It was just Anale and I today, we had the power to do whatever the hell we wanted. The last two days we had by ourselves but today would be different since we decided to stick together. Yet for all the choice we were given one thing was abundantly clear, It was too dangerous to go out fighting monsters today.

"Fuck, I feel exhausted today" I said with a yawn  
"It's your own fault" Anale said "You should have gone to bed like you said you were, but instead you stay up all night singing."  
"That's as much your fault as it is mine"  
"No it wasn't and you know it." As much as I wanted to deny it he wasn't wrong. I got downstairs and couldn't help but join in singing, how could I not? I spent the whole night singing Queen, Smash Mouth and one time a really weird a Capella version of bangarang that ended up as a steaming piece of shit. Before I could reply with an insult my sleep deprived brain seemed fit to make me walk into a tree and fall on my ass, causing Anale to break into laughter.

"You walked into a tree, you fucking scrub"  
"Yes, I really needed your narration" I said as a picked myself up. I was tired but I was as sure as hell not going to sit around on my ass while I could be actually levelling. Besides Anale and I never got to just hang out with the two of us. "Come on, Nakuzi said that this mini dungeon should be around here somewhere"  
"Nakuzi said that there were rumours about a mini dungeon in the far east side of the forest, he didn't give us an exact location Dizmo."  
"Yeah but I can feel it in my bones"  
"You can feel your bones?"  
"You know what I mean Anale, it's got to be around here somewhere." Before Anale could come up with a reply we passed through a particularly dense group of bushes and were greeted with the mouth of a cave, guarded by two grizzly bears.

"Think that's it?" Anale asked and we used the passive skill 'Hide' to seem invisible to the monsters  
"Not a clue, but I haven't seen that mob before."  
"Oh they're just some grizzly bears"  
"Wait you've seen them before?"  
"No, but they are supposed to have a rare smithing ingredient as a drop. Grizzly bear hide, great for making some of the highest quality medium armour on the first floor."  
"You serious? How much do you need to make a full set?"  
"Hmmm, one for legs, arms and belt, two for back and chest so about seven pieces of grizzly bear hide for every set. More if you want it upgraded"  
"Well Anale, It looks like I'm getting some better armour. Even if it's not the dungeon it's still going to be something"  
"Yeah of course it's something, it's a cave"  
"Over the last two day's I've come to miss your company Anale, I completely forgot about your abundant use of sarcasm" I deadpanned, "Alright you ready to go?"  
"Sure, what's the plan?" 

I hadn't actually thought up a plan until Anale asked me, I want to say that I quickly assessed the situation and considered the most effective way to achieve the desired result but in truth I more or less just winged it. "I'm going to climb this tree and when I get to the top I want you to use your Howl skill to lure the bear to you, when they get close enough I'm going to drop down and hit a backstab on one of them while you take care of the other one."  
"You said that you've never seen this mob before"  
"Yeah so?"  
"Whenever we go up against a new mob it takes you a while before you can hit backstabs properly."  
"I didn't realise you noticed that"  
"Of course I noticed, we're friends and friends pay attention to that sort of thing" Anale is full of surprises, his goofy attitude towards the serious situation were in always makes me forget that he can occasionally be very intelligent and observant.

"Well if it doesn't work I'll do what I usually do if I fail a backstab, hit them again while their staggered" Even if the backstab misses by a bit the enemy gets staggered for about two or three seconds, it differs depending on the weight of the opponent but I usually have enough time to deliver a quick slash that more often than not kills the enemy. Especially at the level I'm at, simple tactics like that make killing mobs a breeze. After I was high enough up the tree I called down to Anale as quietly as I could given the situation. "Alright, howl now."

" **OVER HERE YA FUCKING SCRUBS"** Anale screamed at the mobs, It wasn't what I was expecting but it worked so whatever. When the mobs turned active I saw that their cursors were both pure red, meaning that they were both around level eight, ' _oh crap, well now I know why no one found this dungeon. I really should have inspected them before we did this'_ If the mobs at the gate were level eight then all the people coming into this forest expecting level three mobs would have been killed as soon as they found this place.

With a mighty roar that pulled me out of my thoughts the bears charged, I let the first one pass and jumped onto the seconds back. The dagger wasn't a backstab so I leapt off the bear and quickly lunged forward to make a second strike. The fact that the bear did not stagger when the backstab missed didn't register in my brain until the back of its paw impacted with my head and sent me on my ass. I sat in a daze for a few seconds before coming back to reality, that's when I saw the bear on its hind legs preparing to slam its front paws down on me.

"Shit" I gasped as I rolled to the left of the bears attack. A quick look at my health as I hurriedly got into a fighting position told me that the one attack the bear landed on me had taken a tenth of my health. With a roar the bear ran at me, teeth bared and ready to sink into my flesh. I tensed, feet digging into the ground, leg bent and a firm grip on the hilt of my dagger. As soon as the bear was only a few feet away from me I jumped, landing to the left of the beast.

I slashed it's side and jumped back before it could take another cheap swing at me, "What the hell will it take to kill you?" I asked myself as the creature turned and snarled at me. It rose to it's hind legs letting out a massive roar, that was promptly interrupted as Anale ran the beast through using his buster sword. "What was taking you so long? I killed mine in a couple of hits." I doubted that Anale got out of that battle with as much health as mine though, his heavy armour gives him a lot of extra HP but severely stunts his manoeuvrability. Not that he cares, he prefers to be the biggest bastard in the room with the biggest sword.

"It didn't stager after the backstab, I wasn't expecting that." I replied  
"Yeah I saw how it knocked you on your ass, fucking hilarious"  
"And you didn't want to help me then?"  
"You looked like you had the situation under control"  
"I was knocked on my ass and was out of it with a bear about to slam down on me. How did you see that as me being in control of the situation?"  
"I had the sun in my eyes"

I'm pretty sure that my face palm took away some of my health, he can be so annoying sometimes. "Whatever, let's just keep going" I said as we entered the dungeon  
"These guys are pretty high level, nothing like the low level mobs we've been fighting until now"  
"Really? I didn't notice while I was getting thrown around like a ragdoll." I answered sarcastically  
"You should try and pay attention next time"  
"Bloody hell mate, you know what sarcasm is"  
"Yeah of course I do, what's your point?"  
"My point is don't be- CRAP!" I cried as I tripped on a rock and landed on my face  
"Look out for that rock"  
"You're a dick" I said as I got up  
"Shhh, there's a bear over there" Unfortunately he was telling the truth, otherwise I would have given him a very passive-aggressive telling off for letting me trip.

"We should come up with another way to fight these things, there high enough level that we should be careful." I said  
"Good idea what's the plan"  
"I'm thinking of something, do you have any ideas"  
"You come up with the ideas, I'm just here to hit things"  
"that's just stupid" I took a minute of thought before a plan took form in my mind "I'm going to run up to it and slash it in its face taking agro, when it has it's back turn you run them through with your buster sword. Rinse, repeat and win, got it?"  
"Yeah okay" Not exactly an inspiring battle cry but that would have probably attracted the bear to Anale instead of me, so at the time it had to do. Usually with mobs like this I would sneak up to them in an attempt to get the backstab, but since I was the one attracting agro I decided to go a more direct route. " **OVER HERE ASSHOLE** " I screamed as I ran at the beast, the beast let out a mighty roar during which I slashed at its face and ran behind it so that it had its back turned to Anale. The beast snapped at me, attempting to bite my arm off.  
"Feisty son of a bitch aren't you?" I said as I dodged the attack and returned it with a slash of my dagger. "Whenever you're ready Anale"

"Yeah, in a bit"  
"What do you mean in a bit" I called as I dodged another attack from the bear. I couldn't see Anale, I was too busy staring down the bear making sure that if it attacked I would be able to doge it.  
"I mean in a bit"  
"What the fucks keeping you?" The second I asked the question Anale's buster sword sliced into the bear, not killing it but taking enough health away so that I could deliver the killing blow. "Took your bloody time. Seriously, what was keeping you?" I asked Anale.  
"Sun was in my eyes?"  
" **WERE IN A FUCKING CAVE!** " I screamed in reply  
"Oh yeah, right" Anale said with a chuckle that quickly evolved into full out laughter at the expense of my anger.  
"Your un-fucking-believable, quit dicking around while were in a high level area"  
"But that's no fun" He gasped in between fits of laughter.

I waited patiently with my arms crossed for Anale to calm down. After about five minutes of laughter, that seemed to be reignited whenever he looked at my face and the scowl I no doubt was wearing. "You done?"  
"Yeah, alright, fine. Let go"  
"It's about fucking time" I said angrily as Anale's stupid antics began to get on my nerves, It was much easier to ignore him when Banette kept him in check.  
"So you never really told me what you did the last two day's" Anale said as we continued to walk through the dark caves.  
"Didn't I?"  
"No you didn't, want to share your adventures with me? Maybe tell me about that hot chick I saw stalking you?" He asked, lightly elbowing my side and gave me a wink  
"Your gonna love that story" So I told him the story of my first day in as great of detail as possible. The story being broken by four fights with bears, one of which involved two bears.

"So I gave them a shit tonne of money and just left, damn they must have been really confused"  
"HA, man I wonder what they were thinking when you gave then that money." Anale said as I wound my story to a close.  
"Oh yeah when I left I- Oh shit man you see that"  
"Hey it's a chest" Silence fell between the two of us as we eyed the chest, memories of the last chest we found and the outcome of it enveloping my mind, no doubt it was the same for Anale.  
"You open it" I finally said, ' _No way in hell I'm opening this chest and there's no way were going to be leaving it here for someone else if it is a chest. Even if Anale refuses I've got to convince him to open this chest.'  
_ "Okay" Anale said enthusiastically ' _that was easy'_  
"Just like that? No hesitation?"  
"No, why?"  
"Well I sort of got my hands bitten off last time"  
"Oh yeah, that was funny"  
" **FUCK YOU IT WASN'T FUNNY!** "  
"yes it was" He said with a snicker  
"Just open the fucking chest, and don't go crying to me when it turns into a mimic and attacks you."  
"Suit yourself"

Despite myself I watched with worry as Anale approached the chest, I knew that despite what I said if it was a mimic I would jump in to help him. Time seemed to slow as Anale crouched down to open the chest, the chest activated the second his hand made contact with the lock by throwing its lid open. "Hey what's this?" Anale asked searching the contents of the chest and I let out a breath I hadn't even realised I had been holding.

"What did you find?"  
"something called First Strike Ring, I'm pretty sure it's a rare item"  
"Of course it's a rare item, it just my luck. When I open a chest I get attacked by a mimic but when you open a chest what do you get? A rare item." I said annoyed  
"It has a special ability attached to it"  
"What do you mean"  
"It says 'while wearing this ring the first strike of all enemies onto the player will be a miss.'"  
"What the fuck? That sounds way to OP." I said gobsmacked  
"Yeah, and its mine." Anale said with a sinister grin  
"what are the other stats for it? Like speed, armour and attack"  
"All zero"  
"Damn that's a big trade off"  
"Like I care, rings don't give that high of an armour rating anyway"  
"Let's just finish this dungeon and get out, we should be nearing the end soon." There weren't that many enemies in that mini dungeon, but what it lacked in quantity it made up for in challenge. The enemies in the cave were much harder than any enemy Anale and I had versed until then, even the Kobolds from the Labyrinth were easier to kill than the bears. Mainly because of the fact that the bears didn't stagger, which meant I couldn't attack them as fast as I would most other enemies.

Anale and I continued down a straight corridor, even through the darkness I could tell that it was different to the rest of the cave tunnels as the tunnel got narrower and narrower. Eventually the corridor opened up to a massive room, and in the middle was a massive bear that was easily twice the size of the other bears, it was covered in cuts, scars and had a massive gash down its left eye turning it a milky white colour. Upon inspection I saw how the mob was called Yama The Undying and how it was a level ten mini boss with two health bars. "Shit" Anale said.  
"Do you think we can take it on by ourselves?" I asked  
"Who would help us? We don't know anyone besides Banette who would be high enough level to take this thing on with us."  
"We could come back later, we don't have to fight it now."  
"Someone else could have killed it by then, besides were high enough level to kill this thing."  
"Don't be stupid, if we go into this battle half-cocked we could die"  
"So what? We're not going to get anywhere if we don't take risks"

I was quiet for a while, I didn't like it but he was right. If we wanted to help people get out of this game, if we wanted to get out of this game ourselves, than we were going to have to take risks. The argument reminded me of the one we had with Banette in the labyrinth, about whether or not we should grind higher levels. "Yeah you're right, fine let's do this but let's do this carefully." I said as I opened my inventory and pulled out four health potions. "Take one now and have one on your belt in case your health gets too low" I said handing two to Anale before taking my own advice.  
"I didn't know you bought potions, thought you were running low on cor"  
"I didn't buy them I made them, I got into alchemy while we had the couple of days off" that's not entirely a lie since I did make a lot of potions thanks to me falling on my face repeatedly during my failed attempts at levelling acrobatics. With a shrug Anale followed my instructions and readied himself in a battle stance.

"So are we going to take this like the other bears?" Anale asked  
"Yeah, no reason to change a strategy that works. Ready?"  
"Ready" Anale replied  
"Let's go then, be careful" I was thankful that Anale was taking the situation seriously, I guess he understood that goofing off in this situation would probably get him killed. I quickly ran at the bear, slashing its face and running behind it as I had done to all the other mobs up to this point. I jumped back as the bear snapped at me, during this Anale snuck up behind the monster and stabbed his sword straight through the bear's ass. The monster quickly turned around and used its massive paws to swipe Anale away from it, he only barely managed to pull his sword out in time but was still sent flying. With the bear distracted I quickly lunged forwards and stabbed the bear in the back before jumping backwards to avoid the same fate as Anale. "Dizmo, the bear has a bleed effect" Anale told me as I dodged and weaved around the bear to avoid a series of fast attacks.

"Shit, how much damage did you take" I called back to Anale after jumping backwards away from the bear to give myself some breathing room.  
"about a quarter of my health" He said as he sliced vertically at the bear, careful not to get his sword stuck in it again. With the bears back turned I took a stab at it, missing the backstab but not getting hit by the bear in retaliation. All of the attacks that Anale and I had landed on the beast at the point only managed to take down one half of the first health bar. Anale distracted it with another hit which I used to hit it again, doing barley any damage. That's when I decided to do something I rarely do in SAO a sword skill. I preferred to not use sword skills whenever possible, I didn't enjoy the feeling of my body on autopilot while it performed a combination of attacks that I wouldn't be able to pull off in the real world. It's an extremely unsettling experience, but I understand it's benefits in certain situations, fighting a mini- boss in a party of two for example. However I needed to be ready for the post-motion stiffening, the few seconds after the use of a sword skill is when I am most vulnerable.

"I'm going to use a sword skill next time you take agro, cover me in my post" I explained to Anale  
"Got it, I'll do my best" He replied before slicing his sword at the bear, taking its health to about a third of its first health-bar. I used what little distance I had from the bear as a run up, performing the pre-motion moves for the sword skill Blitz Dagger as I ran. My dagger began to glow a crimson red before I delivered a flurry of strikes against the bear, bringing its first health bar to zero.

I was unable to move as my body became ridged due to the Post-motion stiffening effect. All I could do was watch as the bear made a deafening raw and gained a slight brown aura around its body. The bear moved with a new speed previously unseen by the monster as it rammed into my body sending me flying into the cave wall. The bear was in front of me once more before the Post-motion could wear off. It rose itself on its hind legs preparing to perform a no doubt devastating attack. If not for Anale I would no doubt be dead, while the beast had its focus on me Anale ran at the beast with his buster sword dragging on the ground. As the bear rose to its feet Anale took a upwards diagonal swing at the beast giving my Post-motion enough time to wear of and me enough time to recover myself.

A quick look at my health bar showed me some unpleasant news, the beast had in one swipe taken half of my health. Maybe it got a boost in damage, or maybe Anale's stronger armour soaked up more damage than I had originally thought. I decided while using my health potion that I would rather the beast dead than an answer to those questions however. I waited a few seconds for the regenerative properties of the potion to come into effect before going back on the offensive. In that time Anale found himself attempting to doge and block as many of the beast's attacks a possible. I doubted that he could keep that up for long, so with barley a thought on my own safety I jumped at the beast and attempted a backstab. To my surprise I was shown an immense amount of luck when the backstab connected bringing the bears health down to three quarters of its last health bar.

I jumped back from the beast and dodged its barrage of rapid attacks for a while to give Anale some time to recover. The bear had once again backed me into a corner when Anale chose to strike the creature once more, causing it to turn to it's offender. The distraction Anale offered giving me enough time to slash the creature in the back and jump away from the wall. With that the monster's last health bar was brought to half health. "Do you think you can finish this guy off if you used a sword skill?" I asked Anale as I dodged another of the bears attacks.  
"Yeah, if I can land the hit."  
"Just do it!" I screamed as the bear began to back me into the wall yet again.

" **BOLDER CRUSH** " Anale screamed as he slammed his buster sword down through the bears neck and into the ground with such a velocity that it sent rocks flying in random directions. The Bear let out a final roar before it began to glow a bright white and was finally fractalized. The cave was silent besides the slight chiming sound made by the quickly dissipating fractals and the exhausted panting of Anale and myself. We stood there for around five minutes, staring at the place where our foe was slain before I fell back against the rock wall behind me. I started to chuckle and was quickly joined by Anale, our chuckles got louder and louder until the two of us were laughing like madmen.

"We just beat a boss, bloody hell that was intense" I said as our laughter died down.  
"Yeah it was, that guy was still a fucking scrub though. No scrubs going to be taking me out" He said, practically radiating confidence.  
"You did good man, though you don't need to scream your attack before you do it."  
"What are you talking about? Of course I do, screaming your attacks make them do more damage."  
"No they don't" I said with a chuckle.  
"What would you know? You're a fucking scrub." He said, stupid goofy smile plastered on his face.  
"Hey man why did you take damage on that first hit the bear did?" I asked Anale as I considered our battle with the boss bear.  
"Because I got hit"  
"Yeah I know but what about your ring?"  
"My ring? Oh yeah that thing. Actually that's a good question" Anale said as he opened his inventory to examine the ring. "Oh, that's why it didn't work" He exclaimed.  
"What is it?" I asked worried, if it was a glitch that stopped the effect of the ring than we would have lost a major advantage in this death game.  
"I didn't have it equipped, I must have de-equipped my old ring and forgotten to equip the new one. What a fucking scrub moment." He said with a chuckle  
"For fucks sake Anale"

I let out an exhausted yet relived sigh, far too content with our victory to get annoyed at Anale's antics. "Hey didn't you get the last hit bonus?" I asked as I picked myself up from the wall and dusted myself off. The last hit bonus was, as Banette likes to say, "The main reason to be an asshole in a boss fight". The person who gets the last hit on a boss has the highest chance to get a special item at the end. 

"Yeah but it's nothing I would use, some shitty light armour. It would probably sell really good though."  
"Hey mate, I use light armour. Can you show me the stats?"  
"Well it might actually be really good for you, it would increase your health by a shit tone. But it would probably sell for a lot of money, and I like money."  
"Hey man come on, give me the armour already" I said, quickly growing impatient.  
"I don't know, I really like money" He said with his goofy smile. I knew he was just messing with me, but it still pissed me off.  
"Come on man, this is pissing me off now. Just give me the fucking armour already"  
"I could, or I could just sell the armour for money."  
"Shit man, just give me the armour so we can leave and check on Banette"

He had a thoughtful look on his face as he went silent, I was unsure what he was going to do next. Sometimes he would take a joke a bit too far by accident, knowing him he would sell the armour as a joke and find out after the joke was over that the merchants didn't have a buyback option. After about a minute of silence Anale jumped into action. He quickly pulled out a teleport crystal and yelled " **Tolbana"** before I could react. "Shit" I said to myself after he disappeared, but I didn't need to worry. I mean It's not like he would actually sell the armour, he couldn't be that stupid. What am I saying of course he's that stupid.


	6. Chapter 6: A Knights Tale

**Chapter 6: A Knights Tale**

I was struck by fear as a fumbled for a teleport crystal, ' _Oh god he better not sell that armour before I get to him'_ I thought to myself as I teleported myself to Tolbana. The town centre was crowded and I had no hope of finding him with this many people around, unless of course I used my tracking skill. His tracks were fading fast so I had to run full tilt to keep up with them. For a big guy wearing heavy armour he could run really fast, what the hell is he on. He was going much faster than myself, so fast that I was starting to lose his tracks. I was so focused on his tracks that I wasn't watching where I was going, so I ran right into someone and we both tumbled to the ground.

"What the hell?! Get off me!" A familiar female voice said.  
"Hey Minsa, how's it going?" I asked as I picked myself up and offered her a helping hand.  
"Dizmo? What's going on, why were you going so fast" She asked as I helped her up.  
"Listen I would love to stay and chat but I'm in a bit of a rush right now. Did you see a big guy in heavy armour running really fast heading in this direction?"  
"Yeah, he ran through a bunch of people just a few seconds ago. He went that way I think" Minsa informed me as she pointed down a back alley, ' _Why is he going this way?'_ I thought to myself. Before I could ponder on the matter any longer I started to run in the direction that was pointed out to me. " **HEY DIZMO WAIT! WHAT'S GOING ON?** " I Heard Minsa call after me, stopped briefly to turn around and call back " **I'll EXPLAIN LATER** ". Hopefully she will accept that for now, and if she doesn't I still don't care since I can run much faster than her.

The alley I ran through had many twists and turns that only served to slow me down, after the fifth sharp turn I scaled the barrels and windowsills that were dotted around the alleyway so I could reach a more elevated position. Once I got to the top of a roof I just jump the roof tops until I reached the end of the alleyway. I had managed to pick up Anale's trail again thanks to my rooftop shortcut, I decided to stick to the roofs for a moment longer while I followed his trail. I needed to make my way down from the rooftop when I hit a four way intersection, but by then I was much closer. I followed his tracks until I finally found where he ran to, as it turned out he had decided to go back to the Cozy House Inn.

"What the hell was that all about? I thought you were going to sell the armour!" I said as I recovered my breath. Anale on the other hand was a panting mess and looked as if he was about to pass out. "I *pant* fucking *pant* hate *pant* running" Anale Wheezed out as he recovered his breath. "I mean *pant* seriously *pant* fuck the scrub *pant* that invented running"  
"I honestly don't think anyone invented moving your legs"  
"That's what they want you to think!" He exclaimed  
"Who?"  
"The cult of the leg movers"  
"You're a fucking idiot Anale. Now, why the hell did you run away with the armour?"  
"Because I wanted the exercise." He said, infliction in his tone.

"Bullshit, you don't like exercise"  
"Oh yeah, you're right." There was a long moment of silence as he stared at me before he screamed " **IGNORE ME** " as he turned around and walked through the doors of the Inn.

I face palmed and followed him inside "Seriously mate, what did you do to the armour?"  
"Oh yeah that, here you go." He said as he took the armour out of his inventory and gave it to me, I just hoped it was worth the trouble. After inspecting the stats I saw that it would increase my health by half of my current health as well as increase my armour by a few points. When I equipped the back piece I saw that it was a short read cloak, pretty cool. "Thanks mate, though why the hell did you run like that?"

"Well I wanted to use my speed potion"  
"Speed potion? That's a higher level alchemy crafting, how did you get something like that?"  
"Bought it from a guy, don't know what happened to him though"  
"Whatever, let's go check up on Banette. We've been out all day he could be awake now." As soon as I ended that sentence a tall guy wearing what looked like a mix between steel plated and re-enforced iron armour stood up from the bar and half asked half yelled at Anale and I " **DID YOU JUST SAY BANETTE?!** "

"Umm, yeah. Whydo you ask?" The guy walked up to Anale and myself, he stood a head taller than Anale. He stared down at us, his imposing, intimidating stature looming over the two of us. It didn't help that he wore steel plated armour and had an iron-reinforced helmet on. All I know about steel is what Anale has told me. Anale says that steel can only be made by blacksmiths of a high enough level, that's not the bad part though. The correct ingredients to properly make good steel ingots are extremely hard to find on the first floor. Thanks to that steel armour is currently selling for thousands of cor. That meant that this guy was most likely a high level player or a player rich enough to buy extremely strong equipment.

He looked down at me before he said "Do you know where I can find that bastard?"  
"Course' we do, why should we tell a scrub like you though?"  
"Anale shut the hell up!" I snapped at Anale, I really didn't want to antagonize this guy. "Sorry sir, I didn't catch your name." I said to the hulking man in armour.

"I am Sir Jindo, the greatest swords man in Aincrad. The filthy peasant known as Banette has slighted me, therefore I must defeat him in a duel. You will reveal the location of the vagabond or you shall feel my ire." It took me a second to realise why this guy was speaking as if King Arthur himself shoved Excalibur up his ass. Then I realised, this guy was a role-player. In the days after SAO's release and before everyone was trapped here role-players were really common. Everyone was running around claiming to be knights of yore, hell Laughing Koffin started off as a bunch of people role-playing bandits. Though after everyone got trapped here role-playing kind of started to die out, from what I've heard there are still a handful of people who still role-play. Of course no one calls anyone in Laughing Koffin role-players since they literally became a group of cutthroats. This guy was obviously roleplaying as a knight, most role-players left in SAO are knights.

"How did Banette slight you exactly?" I asked  
"He joined me on a particularly difficult quest in the mountains when we were set upon by a great beast, a boss of its kind. After we defeated the beast he claimed a piece of loot for himself instead of parting with it to me. I have been searching for the cur ever since, my searching has led me to this Inn"  
"Okay so what exactly did he get?"  
"The thief walked away with a pair of powerful iron gauntlets that I require to replace my own copper pair"  
"It doesn't look like you need those gauntlets, you've got enough shit already" Anale stated  
"You would do well to hold your tongue knave, my patients may not last much longer."  
"I'll go get him, just try and put up with Anale for a bit longer" I said, trying to calm Sir Jindo down.

I left Anale with Sir Jindo while I went to Banette's room to see if he was awake. I decided to knock on his door first in case he was awake. "Go fuck yourself with a cactus" Banette groaned through the door. I opened the door and walked into his room only to find that Banette was still in bed. "Time to get out of bed sleeping beauty, there's someone downstairs that wants to see you"  
"Tell him to fuck off" Banette stated groggily  
"I don't think he would like that, you need to go see him"  
"No"  
"Come on man"  
"I don't want to"  
"your always forcing Anale and I out of bed"  
"Fuck you"  
"Listen, I need you to go downstairs"  
"Why should I?"  
"Because you pissed him off and he's her for your gloves"

Banette sat up in his bed and stared at me "Who the fuck wants my gloves? I don't own a pair of gloves"  
"Some guy downstairs says you stole his gauntlets" I told him  
"Gauntlets aren't gloves"  
"I don't give a fuck, he's pissed off and want to duel you" 

Banette let out a sigh as he got out of bed, thankfully he hadn't changed and was still in the clothes he was wearing when Anale and I threw him into bed. "What's the asshole's name?" Banette asked as he stretched his back.  
"Some guy calling himself Sir Jindo"  
"Fuck, that asshole? The guys nothing but a whiny bitch that won't shut up about honour, justice and other shit like that."  
"He says you helped him kill a boss than stole the loot"  
"Bullshit! I got the last hit on that boss, the gauntlets are mine."  
"Well go tell him that, he's downstairs with Anale right now."  
"You left him with Anale? What are you, stupid?"  
"Oh shit, you're right" I said in revelation before bolting out the door to run downstairs. Why the hell would I leave Anale alone with some guy that calls himself the best swordsman in Aincrad? I would be lucky If Sir Jindo was still putting up with Anale's shit for this long.

I reached the bottom of the stairs and went straight to where I left Sir Jindo and Anale. I got lucky this time, Sir Jindo looked as if he was about to lose it. "Look all I'm saying is that it would be funny if you challenge some guy to a sword fight using a spork"  
"Listen here you insolent fool-"  
"Banette will be right down" I said drawing their attention and cutting off Sir Jindo mid-sentence.  
"Thank you, I have had more than enough of the rhetoric your insufferable friend claims as a conversation."  
"Well fuck you, you scrub."  
"What does that even mean?"  
"Are you telling me the Mr Sir doesn't know what scrub means?"  
"My name is not Mr Sir, I am Sir Jindo"  
"Whatever you say Sir Scrub"  
"Silence you fool, or I shall show you the point of my sword!" Sir Jindo threatened as he unsheathed his sword.  
"Anale shut the fuck up, you're an idiot" Banette said as he finally arrived.  
"So you finally decide to show your face, you coward."  
"This better be fucking important Jindo, I needed to get out of bed for this and I hate getting out of bed for anyone who isn't me."  
"My name is Sir Jindo, I suggest scum such as yourself remember that." Sir Jindo said as he pointed his sword at Banette.  
"No, your fucking name is Jindo. Now give me one good reason not to beat the shit out of you for wasting my time."  
"I demand a duel, the victor's reward shall be the gauntlets dropped by the boss we defeated" Silence enveloped the Inn, people all turned their heads to look at the Sir Jindo and Banette as they stared intensely at each other. Or at least I Imagine they were staring intensely at each other, it's kind of hard to tell when one is wearing a hood that obscures his face and the other is wearing a helmet. Still the atmosphere in the room was tense, no one knew what was going to happen next.  
"Alright, if you want me to fuck you up I'm more than happy to beat the shit out of you. Come on then, we'll duel outside." Just like Banette, wanting to get it out of the way as soon as possible.

What few people that were in the Inn moved outside to watch the excitement as it unfolded, Anale and myself included. I didn't know what to expect from this fight, Sir Jindo was decked in some of the best armour I had seen so far and he wielded his one-handed sword with a confidence that made it obvious he knew how to use it. Banette on the other hand, actually I had no idea what to expect from Banette. Whenever we went grinding he just punched the shit out of everything, but he did it in a lazy way that made me think he found no challenge from grinding and wasn't actually trying. Right now Banette's body language was more focused on Sir Jindo, he looked tense and ready to strike. He looked more alert and intimidating than I had ever seen him.

"You will feel defeat on this day Banette" Sir Jindo taunted as he sent Banette a duel request  
"Sure, whatever you fucking say" Banette replied as he accepted the request.  
"The loser is decided by whoever's health reaches zero first, you should be easily defeated judging by the armour you're wearing, if I can even call your rags armour" Sadly that was a very apt description of Banette's armour, he still wore little more than rags and gauntlets while Sir Jindo wore extremely strong armour for this floor. It was still extremely difficult for me to determine who would win, i tried to study everything I could to figure out who would win. Besides the tensed muscles and the straight back that opposed his usual slouch Banette maintained a casual position with his arms at his side. Sir Jindo on the other hand had one foot in front of the other, his sword drawn pointing upwards held out in front of him. Both Banette and Sir Jindo had their heads trained on each other and the only thing I could decipher from the way they were speaking was that Sir Jindo believed completely that he would win, Banette still kept his carefully woven facial mask of neutrality that was beginning to look more and more like a mask of mystery as I couldn't obtain a single detail as to how he would fight past punching the shit out of him. Sir Jindo looked like he would start of by rushing Banette head on, perhaps in an attempt to end this as quickly as possible.

The crowds were calling out there preferred fighter form the sidelines as the counter ticked down. 3, " **YEAH, GO BANETTE! KICK THAT SPORK HATERS ASS!** " Anale scream next to me as I studied the fighters. 2, "Draw your weapon vagabond, I would prefer to not defeat an enemy without a weapon" Sir Jindo said to Banette who replied with silence. 1, The fight was on, Sir Jindo leapt forward to strike Banette who easily dogged by stepping to the left. Banette then countered by striking Sir Jindo in the stomach. "I'm not a pussy who needs to use a weapon" Banette began before using the hand that wasn't shoved in Sir Jindo's stomach to punch him in the face and send him flying backwards several feet as he lost a fifth of his health. "BITCH I AM A WEAPON!" Banette exclaimed as Sir Jindo reclaimed his footing.

When Sir Jindo steadied himself he took on a more defensive stance, moving his footing slightly in preparation to dodge. "You were talking all the big shit before, and then I punched you in the fucking face!" Banette then ran at Sir Jindo, aiming to punch him in the face again. Banette tried to uppercut but Sir Jindo dodged backwards and tried to strike Banette by lunging his sword at his chest. Banette easily dodged the attack by ducking and countered with an uppercut. "Where's your chivalry now bitch?" Banette taunted, "Silence you knave" Sir Jindo retorted as he swung his sword at Banette, slicing Banette across the chest, taking away about two fifths of his health. Another hit like that and Banette would be dead, he's have to keep up with his speedy dodging if he wanted to win.

Sir Jindo saw that he had the advantage and made to attack Banette again, striking him from below, Banette jumped over the strike and made a counter aiming for the stomach. Sir Jindo dodged to the left and made to counter with a strike to the head which Banette easily dodged under and returned with a punch to the gut. One more hit from Banette and Sir Jindo would be at half health, whoever landed the next hit would win. Sir Jindo jumped away from Banette before he could deliver a finishing blow to Sir Jindo. Then the two just stared at each other in silence, no taunts or insults just silence. A silence so intense that even the crowd of excited onlookers grew quiet. Then suddenly Sir Jindo attacked, jumping at Banette and used a one handed sword skill to delivering a flurry of strikes in quick succession. His blade was moving so fast that it was close to a blur, then my heart stopped as Banette was hit by the final strike in the combo. I waited for my friend's defeat to be announced, but it never came. I looked at Banette's health and saw he had only just a sliver of health above the half way mark, I had completely forgotten about the battle healing skill. Banette must have it levelled up if he was able to regenerate enough health to survive the second strike.

Banette moved as if the strike didn't faze him and punched Sir Jindo in the face, delivering the final strike and wining the duel. The crowd was shocked, no one even entertained the thought that a player wearing nothing but rags could defeat a player with armour like Sir Jindo. None except for Anale and myself it seemed, especially Anale. " **SUCK IT SIR SCRUB, EAT THAT SHIT WITH A RUSTY SPORK** " He screamed over the astonished quietness of the crowd.

"You defeated me" Sir Jindo said to himself in shock. He quickly snapped out of this shock and gave Banette a curt bow, "As much as this outcome goes against my favour I am a man of my word. Congratulations on your victory." The Sir Jindo quickly picked up his helmet and walked away with his head bowed, the crowd quickly dissipating with him.

"Yeah Banette, you beat the shit out that fucking scrub. Man that was awesome." Anale exclaimed as we walked up to Banette.  
"Whatever" Banette replied  
"So what's the deal with those role-players anyway?" I asked  
"How the fuck would I know, why don't you go fucking ask Sir Jindo?"  
"That's a good idea, Anale you wanna tag along?"  
"Fuck no"  
"Alright then, see you guys when I get back to the Inn" I told my friends as I walked in the direction I saw Sir Jindo leave.  
"Whatever"  
"See ya later scrub"

I followed Sir Jindo's tracks at a much more sedated pace compared to when I last used my tracking ability to chase Anale, since Sir Jindo wasn't running like a bat out of hell. So after about five minutes of strolling through the overcrowded town of Tolbana I finally found Sir Jindo sitting by a water fountain. His helmet was removed as he looked into the small pool of the fountain. Now that I could see his face I noticed how young he was, despite his height he couldn't be any older than fourteen. His messy short dark blond hair was a shade off from being called brown and his emerald green eyes had an intensity that of which radiated seriousness. His height and stature were less intimidating without his helmet, but he still didn't look like someone I would like to fuck with.

I walked up to the fountain and sat so I was facing him, he noticed my reflection and looked up at me. His face showed a moment of surprise before it converted to caution, his intense eye's never once ceasing in their intensity. I considered whether or not my previous decision about his lack of helmet being less intimidating, his eyes felt like they were burrowing into my very soul. "What are you doing here?" He asked slowly, I could tell from his tone he didn't want me to be here.  
"Just wanted to ask you a few questions about roleplaying."  
"Well I don't really want to answer them right now, so would you be so kind as to just leave me alone." It wasn't a question, it was an order. I had to wonder how someone so young could speak with such well-mannered words while carrying such an forceful tone.  
"You look like you need someone to talk to." I had seen Sir Jindo's look before, it seemed like everyone carried one like it in SAO eventually. He was starting to break and in SAO there were two types of people, the types who break easy and the types that break hard. Sir Jindo was obviously part of the latter since most people who break easy jumped to their deaths in the first couple of weeks.

"Did you not hear my words you fool? I choose to not answer your inquiries." He snapped at me.  
"You don't have to answer any questions, I just thought you looked like you needed to vent. There are tonnes of different ways to vent, some like to go for runs or listen to music, others like to talk or scream at people." I can talk all day if I want to, but I'm also good at listening. Several people like to use me to vent off their frustrations so I know a thing or two about venting, it's also a good way to confront fears deal with grief which is something I bet a lot of people in SAO feel.

"What about you then? How do you vent?" Sir Jindo asked me, considering my words.  
"It depends really, but in SAO I found a good way to deal with the stress of living here. First day here I found this nice, peaceful little place. Out of the way of everything else, in fact I'm pretty sure I could count all the people who know about the place on one hand. First time saw the place it took my breath away, I was speechless. Hell even Anale was speechless and he never shuts up. I like to go there every once in a while to think."  
"I don't think that would help me, listening to quiet only makes me restless. That's why I'm here, in the middle of a crowded town, I prefer action to inaction. Things like this talk are just a waste of my time." It's obvious that he needed the help, and if he couldn't get a psychologist then he would get me as a replacement.

"Listen I said I would help you vent and I want to keep to my word, Let's have a duel."  
"A duel?" Sir Jindo asked, sounding surprised "Do you honestly think you could beat me?"  
"Probably not, but it could be fun."  
"Why do you even care about helping me vent my frustrations"  
"I don't care about you, you can stay Sir Jindo and never have to tell me your name. All I care about is that another person won't go jumping off Aincrad. So even if I need to duel someone to help them put their head on straight, then it's for a good cause" There was a few seconds of silence between the two of us before he decided to speak.  
"Very well then, I accept this duel and the conditions that go with it. Do you have a location in mind for this duel."  
"How about we head over to the lake in the north-east? There's a lot of open space to duel and nice scenery to look at while we talk."  
"Very well, let us continue to tranquil lakes then."  
"Is that what it's called?"  
"It is what the fishermen call it yes, you didn't know?"  
"I suffer from a mix of being too busy to find out the names of places, being too lazy to find out their names and being Anale's friend slash babysitter." With that said Sir Jindo put his helmet back on and we continued to the apparently named Tranquil lake, funny how things have names. With all the time I spend all around the map with Anale and Banette you would think I would have decided to find out what certain areas are called.

Very little was said between Sir Jindo and I as we made our way to the lake, but that doesn't mean I didn't learn anything about him. I paid careful attention to the way he fought as he killed all the monsters in our way, he appeared to be impatient and would always go for the first strike. That's most likely the reason he uses one handed swords instead of a shield or a two handed sword, either of which would complement his heavy armour nicely. Instead it looked like he wore heavy armour for the defence and had to balance out his speed stats by using a lighter weapon. This is something I've seen done before, but it also meant that he was still slower than most other light weapon wielders such as myself. My speed would be my saving grace in the battle to come, but from the battle with Banette I saw how fast this guy can attack when he used his sword skill. I knew my speed was as high as if not higher than Banette's though, since Banette focused on increasing his strength and stamina instead of his speed and stamina like me. Sir Jindo most likely spread his skill focus out even more, either that or he let one vital skill drop. He would need high strength and speed to fight the way he does while still lugging around that heavy ass armour, another important skill for his build would be health. Thinking back on his previous duel with Banette did however reveal that he had low health, since it only took him around a dozen punches to drop him to half health.

Not many people chose to duel in SAO, but when they do they usually do a first hit duel. Half health duels aren't used due to the risk of getting your enemy to the red or even killing them on accident if you land a crit finishing hit. There are two likely reasons to why Sir Jindo chooses half health duels, or at least I came to two possibilities immediately and decided that these were the two most likely reasons. One being that he craves a fight, he told me earlier how action calms him down that and by the look of armour he is obviously good at fighting mobs and finishing quests this makes It very possible that he just loves fighting, The other being that his skills made it so that he's bad at dodging fast attacks, so if his first attack doesn't connect then he's pretty much screwed due to heavy armour.

If I managed to dodge his first attack then kept him at a distance than I should be fine, I was going to have to focus on parrying and dodging to make counter attacks to damage him instead of hitting him head on. If I stick to that strategy then I should be able to do some damage, but it still didn't know how much damage he actually did. Sure I had seen him hit Banette, but I didn't really know how much health Banette has. All I really know about Banette's stats is that he has an insanely low armour rate due to his lack of actual armour, hell if it wasn't for his gauntlets his armour rate would be next to zero.

"I believe that this would be an adequate location to do battle" Sir Jindo said, snapping me out of my thoughts and bringing me back to the real world. "What say you then Mr…"  
"Dizmodon, but please just call me Dizmo. Sorry I didn't tell you earlier, It must have slipped my mind."  
"No need to worry, I should have inquired your name before accepting your duel. Now what do you think of this location?" He asked me. I made note of the way his helmet caused his voice to echo and sound deeper, this combined with his height, his well-spoken nature and his proper posture perfected an illusion of him being older than he appeared.  
"This place looks as good as any" I said as I looked upon the lake.

"Let us duel than, draw your weapon" He said as he sent me a challenge to a duel "Please tell me that you actually use a weapon, unlike your vagrant friend from earlier." I accepted the duel with a chuckle as I unsheathed my dagger. "It amuses me that you think yourself capable of defeating me with a butter knife" Sir Jindo taunted  
"Says the guy who got the shit kicked out of him by a guy with no weapon"  
"How crass" we became silent as we stared each other down, he with his helmet and myself with my hood. I took on a stance that would make it easy to doge as the time ticked down to zero and the fight began.

Just as I had guessed Sir Jindo launched himself at me the second the timer hit zero, he tried to hit me with a low strike from below. Smart since my dagger had a short reach and made it hard for me to dodge low strikes. I jumped over him and sliced his back as I landed, taking his health down by about a tenth. Nine more hits without crits, less if I'm lucky ten if I'm not or if he has a high enough battle healing skill. I ducked under a blow aiming for my head as he turned around and countered with a slash to the chest. The battle was looking easier than I thought it would be, at the rate I was going I would have been done in only a few minutes. I jumped back to dodge a downward slice and attempted a counter attack that was dodged and returned as Sir Jindo countered my attack with his own, taking a quarter of my health in the process.

I went into a slight panic and tried delivering several fast hits on him managing to take his health down to half but taking another blow in the process. I Jumped back and took a breath to clear my mind, another stupid mistake like that and the duel will end a lot quicker. Sir Jindo lunged at me again, causing me to dodge to the left and hit him with another strike. Four or five more hits and I win, I just needed to keep my cool about me. I waited for him to attack me again, when he did I dodged around him and took a slice at his back. I was lucky enough to land a critical that delivered double damage, only a couple more hits and the battle was over. He became more defensive forcing me to go on the attack, he lunged at me as soon as I got close. I managed to dodge the first attack, but I missed my counter and got hit by his second blow. We stood still staring at each other, neither of us wanting to be the one to go on the offensive.

Eventually Sir Jindo decided to strike, he ran at me from the left. As I dodged from the left Sir Jindo attacked from the right, he faked to the left causing me to fall into his little trap. The battle was over and I stood the loser, my health was in the yellow so I popped a health potion. "Well thought, an invigorating battle." Sir Jindo said before I offered him a health potion.  
"Yeah it was pretty good, It made me realise that I should prepare for when the monsters start to get armour."  
"Is there truly a need to worry for the higher floors? Why worry about a future that may not come?"  
"Alright then, what you just said is grim as fuck."

I said as I sat on the ground. Sir Jindo Showed a moment of hesitation before he joined me. He took of his helmet sat in silence for a long moment before he spoke.  
"Well I wanted to ask you about roleplaying earlier, would you mind if I asked you a few questions about it?"  
"What is it you inquire to know about the art of roleplaying"  
"Why are you roleplaying? In general I mean, not just SAO."  
"My tale of roleplaying began when my cousin introduced me to the game known as World of Warcraft. I was young but I instantly grew enamoured with it and the people who played it, my cousin played with me throughout my progression of my character. That is when he introduced me to the concept of roleplaying, and I found a kinship with creating my characters as knights. Protectors of the weak, defenders of the land, fighters for what is right. Every time my cousin and I found a new MMO I would create a knight, someone to absorb the damage of my enemies and the enemies of my allies. In WOW I would create a paladin, in Guild Wars a Guardian, In TERA a lancer and so on. Everything after that, as they say, is history."  
"So is your cousin playing SAO?"  
"Yes, he goes by the name of Sir Diavel and is a knight, much like myself."  
"Cool, I haven't seen that many role-players around SAO. Where are they?"  
"How would I know? Most role-players stopped when we became trapped in these lands, the rest are not so vocal about their roleplaying. Rest assured there are still many dedicated to role-playing, but with the way role-players are ostracized we don't really feel safe with declaring our desire to partake in role-playing." I hadn't really thought about it before, but role-players did become the butt of every joke after Kayaba trapped everyone in SAO. I guess they were an easy target since being a role-player now seems like a waste of time, time that could have been spent fighting the labyrinth.

"That doesn't sound fair to me"  
"It isn't, but I can't really blame them. Role-players such as myself have found a way of both insulting and scaring people at the same time. Most think that role-players are either one step away from joining Laughing Koffin, or that were happy to be stuck in these infernal pits." There was silence once more as I considered what he told me. The mood became increasingly melancholy, I looked over as Sir Jindo who was looking at the lake with the same far off look he had when first saw him at the fountain.  
"How old are you?" I finally asked  
"fourteen, why?"  
"thought so" I said "No reason." A kid this young was stuck in a hellhole where he was treated like a fucking outcast, just because of how he plays the game. I had almost forgotten how much I wanted to beat the shit out of Kayaba.  
"When we all get out of this, that fucker Kayaba is going to get what's coming to him."  
"Most likely"  
"You're really mature for your age"  
"So I have been told" It was getting dark now, and I probably should have started to head home.  
"Want another duel?" I asked. He won the second round.

E/N: Dizmo keeps making mistakes, then fixing them later, he misspelt 'dodge' multipul times as 'doge' then a few sentences later he uses Dodge instead of doge… Dizmo get your shit in order, for an Australian you're terrible at English.


End file.
